Alberta urged to test children early for hearing loss

Expert says kids, taxpayers paying price

Dawn Urschel didn’t know her two-yearold daughter Vanessa had hearing problems until her sister, a teacher, said she thought Vanessa had a speech delay.

When Vanessa was three, a hearing test revealed that she did, indeed, have both congenital and sensory hearing loss.

Dawn said that as a new mom she wouldn’t have even expected that Vanessa could have hearing problems.

“It wouldn’t have even crossed my mind,” she said. “There wasn’t any hearing loss in any of my relatives.”

Alberta is one of four provinces in the country that doesn’t have a universal newborn hearing screening program.

Dr. Hema Patel, a prominent Montreal pediatrician, said she can’t understand why there isn’t a program.

“It’s a win-win situation. Early intervention is better for the children and dramatically improves their language and cognition outcome, and it saves governments money,” said Patel, who visited the Alberta Children’s hospital Wednesday to speak about the importance of establishing an early hearing detection and intervention program in the province.

“I think most everyday Albertans don’t even know that this is a problem, don’t even know that children aren’t screened, don’t even know that their children are paying a price and that taxpayers are paying for it.”

That price is the cost of special education and a loss of language and literacy in children whose hearing loss is detected late, Patel said. She noted hearing loss in the average Alberta child with a hearing impairment is picked up after they’re a year old.

“The brain has already been modified,” Patel said.

“Their whole trajectories in life are changed because of that late diagnosis and it didn’t have to be that way,” she added.

When hearing loss isn’t detected early, which is before the age of one, according to Patel, the brain reconfigures itself to cope. Patel said that without intervention, hearing loss severely affects speech and literacy.

Sarah Burns, an audiologist who works with the Edmonton Public School Board, said she sees the effects of late intervention every day.

“I see the impact of hearing loss on literacy, on understanding, on childhood development,” she said.

Burns is among a handful of Edmonton activists who are petitioning the government to implement a universal newborn hearing screening program.

There’s national support for the issue, too.

The Canadian Association of Speech-Language Pathologists made a submission to the government earlier this year recommending universal access to newborn hearing screening and programs to “facilitate the early identification and intervention of speechlanguage and hearing disorders in young children.”

I see the impact of hearing loss … on childhood develop

ment.

SARAH BURNS,

AUDIOLOGIST

In their position statement authored by Patel, the Canadian Paediatric Society states that “earlier intervention translates to improved language outcomes; and in well-run programs, there is negligible harm from screening.”

The provincial government considered implementing a universal newborn hearing screening program in 2003 and 2007 but decided against it.

But Patel said there is exhaustive evidence in support of the program, and that the overall cost of implementation is reasonable.

She said Quebec’s early hearing detection program, launched in 2008, was budgeted at about $5 million a year, and estimated an Alberta program would cost about $10 million. There would be significant cost savings because of a decreased need for special education as hearing impaired children grow up, Patel added.

“The tests that are being done in the rest of Canada are being done in the newborn nurseries before discharge and are inexpensive, cost-effective, non-invasive, and very well-accepted by parents,” she said.

No one from Alberta Health was able to comment on the province’s current position on an early hearing detection program.

However, a statement from spokesman Howard May said the department is working with Alberta Health Services to “review the development of infant and preschool screening programs in Alberta.”

Dawn said she hopes a universal program is implemented in Alberta.

Vanessa, now 20 and studying at the University of Calgary, has thrived in school, but Dawn said knowing about her daughter’s hearing loss earlier could have helped even more.