1. School Hearing Screening Windsor State School – November 2017

2. We are experts in helping you give children the best start in life.
About Hear and Say
We are experts in helping you give children the best start in life.
We are a Queensland-wide children’s charity helping families achieve the best outcomes for their children by ensuring children can hear and be heard.
Hear and Say provides specialist paediatric diagnostic services in audiology and currently delivers an impactful hearing screening program across Queensland.

3. 90% of the brain is developed by the age of 5

4. Between Prep and Year 12 a child’s brain continues to develop
With every fact, figure and activity, the brain rewires itself as it learns.

5. Ears are the gateway to the brain

7. Program Results to date
More than 18,000 children screened
23% Preps required follow-up (mostly Otitis Media and wax management issues)
16 children diagnosed with sensorineural loss/mixed hearing loss
29 children diagnosed with conductive loss
10 children found with foreign objects in ear
5 children found with ruptured eardrums
1 child being monitored for cochlear implants

8. Ensuring children get the most from their education
Academic effects:
Decreased academic achievement including language and vocabulary
Delays in development, reading, spelling, math and problem solving
Lower scores on achievement tests
Greater need for enrolment in special education and support classes
Children may:
Have feelings of isolation, exclusion, embarrassment, confusion and helplessness
Refuse to participate in group activities
Act withdrawn or sullen
Have significant problems following directions

9. The need to screen school aged children
IMPACT OF HEARING LOSS:
A mild or moderate case of hearing loss could bring difficulty in:
learning
developing speech and
building the important interpersonal skills necessary to foster self-esteem and succeed in school and in life.
Poor outcomes:
Half of juveniles in detention in NSW have a hearing loss.
An individual with hearing loss can have early contact with the criminal justice system due to problematic linguistic development during childhood, which results in poor written literacy and communication, and subsequent poor education and employment outcomes. Hearing loss can have a direct link to recidivism with individuals often breaching parole or bail due to miscommunication.

10. 2. Tympanometry Test of middle ear to detect middle ear infection
Screening
2. Tympanometry Test of middle ear to detect middle ear infection
3. Pure Tone Audiometry screening under noise cancelling headphones to assess hearing across the four major speech frequencies (0.5-4kHz)
1. Otoscopy A look inside the ear and allows screeners to determine if the ear is clear for testing

11. SCHOOL HEARING SCREENING RESULTS
Overall recommendation
Otoscopy results
Tympanometry results
Hearing screening results

12. SCHOOL HEARING SCREENING RESULTS
Hear and Say runs a regular bulk bill clinic at our Ashgrove Centre

13. What to look for Identifying children with hearing loss
Even a child who has passed the newborn hearing screening must be monitored
Some common warning signs:
Speech/language delay
Says “what?” or “huh?” often
Difficulty hearing on the phone
Decreased alertness and poor attention and concentration
Signs of boredom
Watching others for cues
Academic difficulties or behaviour problems

14. Help them to