Protect your hearing as early as possible

2023-11-13

Epidemiological survey data show that the incidence of hearing impairment in normal newborns is 0.1% to 0.3%, of which the incidence of severe to extremely severe hearing impairment is about 0.1%. The main factors leading to deafness include ototoxic drugs, genetics, infection and disease. The number of people who are deafened due to environmental noise pollution and accidents is also gradually increasing.

Hearing impairment not only causes communication barriers, but also causes a variety of psychological problems, seriously affecting the social interactions and personal quality of life of hearing-impaired people. Faced with the large number of hearing-impaired people, in addition to taking necessary medical and rehabilitation measures, the key to preventing hearing impairment is to actively carry out newborn hearing screening, popularize hearing health care knowledge, carry out deafness genetic counseling, strengthen medical monitoring and scientific medication.

How to prevent and treat hearing damage

Protect hearing as early as possible, and pay attention to fetal hearing health care during pregnancy. For example, the mother should try to avoid receiving preventive injections; do not receive abdominal radioactive radiation; prevent bacterial infections in the mother, and treat them promptly if infected; ototoxic drugs are prohibited when taking medications ( Salicylic acid preparations, antibiotics and other drugs). During pregnancy, not only will the fetus suffer organic damage to the auditory central nervous system, but the inner ear hair cells may also be damaged.

In addition, trauma caused by premature labor induction, accidental hypoxia during pregnancy or delivery, neonatal jaundice, etc. may all cause sensorineural deafness. Therefore, early prevention and timely treatment of these diseases are important links in the prevention and treatment of neonatal deafness.

The period before the age of 5 is a critical period for children's language development. Hearing loss during this period will not only cause delayed language development or deafness, but also affect children's intellectual development and cause problems in psychological and social communication. Newborn hearing screening and joint deafness gene screening are effective means to detect hearing problems as early as possible. Currently, a two-stage screening method is adopted, namely preliminary screening and re-screening: the newborn is initially screened 48 hours after birth and before discharge. If the newborn fails to pass the screening, it will enter the re-screening stage when the newborn is 42 days old; re-screening still has problems Yes, a systematic audiological diagnosis will be carried out at 3 months. When hearing impairment is diagnosed, early intervention will be carried out.

Clinically, it is often found that some children who passed the hearing screening at birth develop hearing impairment later in life. Therefore, parents should pay continuous attention to their children's hearing care, and pay special attention to newborns with high-risk factors for hearing loss, such as premature infants, low-birth-weight infants, and newborns with a family history of hearing impairment. Even if these children pass the hearing screening, they should go to a professional hearing clinic for a hearing examination every year before the age of 3.

For healthy children who pass the newborn hearing screening and have no high-risk factors for hearing, what issues should parents pay attention to as they grow up? Generally speaking, there are some nodes worthy of attention in the growth process of infants and young children. For example, babies between 1 and 3 months old will have a startle reaction when faced with sudden loud sounds; babies between 3 and 6 months old will have a startle reaction. Can look for or turn to the source of a sound; 6 to 9-month-old babies will turn to the person or object mentioned in the speech; 9-12-month-old babies will follow the instructions of adults and perform actions; 12-15-month-old children can speak Produce a single word. Once abnormalities are discovered, you need to go to a professional medical institution for examination as soon as possible.

For older children, parents can pay attention to whether their children have some special behaviors. For example, they always ignore their parents' words; they are used to turning the volume very loud when watching TV; they react when there are abnormal noises. , but the child is always silent; the child is used to listening with only one ear when answering the phone. If the above situation occurs, you should suspect that your child may have hearing abnormalities and go to a professional medical institution for examination as soon as possible. In addition, 60% of children have experienced acute otitis media. For children with more severe conditions, a hearing evaluation should be performed during the reexamination. For children, water entering the ears while swimming or washing their faces may cause otitis media, but more emphasis should be placed on preventing otitis media caused by upper respiratory tract infections.

Some children with hearing impairment are discovered during the physical examination at kindergarten. Therefore, parents should pay attention to kindergarten physical examinations and call on all kindergartens to include hearing screening as part of the physical examination at entry.

What to do if hearing impairment occurs

Regardless of adults or children, once hearing impairment occurs, it should be checked and treated as soon as possible. If it is conductive hearing loss, that is, there is a problem with the conduction of the middle ear path, it is highly reversible, and hearing can be restored to normal through drug or surgical treatment. If it is sensorineural deafness, that is, the auditory nerve and cochlea are damaged, the probability of improving or restoring hearing through drug treatment is very low. Such patients can choose to wear hearing aids or cochlear implants.

Before wearing a cochlear implant, you should go to a regular hospital to evaluate the degree of hearing loss, and a professional doctor will formulate a hearing compensation plan. Many children or parents feel that wearing hearing aids is "embarrassing" and "will be discriminated against", so they refuse to wear them. In fact, wearing hearing aids is like wearing glasses. It is an important way for children to regain hearing. If a child has severe or extremely severe hearing loss, cochlear implants are an effective method for hearing reconstruction. The earlier the implant is implanted, the better it will be for the child's language learning. A considerable number of deaf children have hearing loss caused by inner ear malformations. These children can improve or restore their hearing through surgery.

No matter what the cause of hearing impairment is, whether it is an adult or a child, we should pay more attention, detect it early, diagnose it early through professional screening, and treat it early depending on the individual.