Hello all. This is our story…
Our son was born 6 weeks premature. Mommy has type 2 diabetes. Son was on cpap for a day and had a rough start but came through it all healthy. He is now 2 1/2 years old.
He failed his initial hearing test in his right ear. I believe he was 5 or 6 days old. The audiologist suggested a retest at 5 months old. We did that and they did a brainwave test and the ear plug test. (sorry I do not have his paperwork in front of me so I do not know the true names of tests).
His audiologist typed in the report that hearing was normal in the left ear and that the right ear was unable to test due to artifact. However, at the end of her report she typed that his hearing was normal in both ears and we were told that he passed. We were so happy that we did not question things we know nothing about.
Fast forward 2 years…
My sons speech was not developing like our other 4 childrens did so we enrolled him into speech therapy. After 6 visits with absolutely no progress the therapist recommended another hearing test.
We went back to the same nationally known Children’s Hospital that he was tested at both times previously.
This Audiologist did some testing and said that he had a profound hearing loss in his right ear. She recommended more testing be done and scheduled us another appointment.
At this next appointment we had two different Audiologist’s. They did more testing and confirmed the profound hearing loss. They also informed us that they looked at my sons previous tests and realized that when my son was tested at 5 months that he obviously failed and the Audiologist should not have passed him. I asked one of the Dr’s if it was obvious that he failed or if the previous Dr could have just read the test wrong. She stated that it was blatently obvious that he failed.
That same day we received a phone call from the Program Director of Audiology. She apologized to us for the “mishap” and stated that it shouldn’t have happened. We also learned that the Audiologist is no longer doing testing on that floor.
My son received a hearing aid a couple of weeks ago and today we went for another tests. I began asking questions about what kind of long term damage has my son suffered because of this misdiagnosis. The Doctor informed us that our sons development was greatly affected. Not only his speech. He did not walk until he was 19 months old and then not very well. I got very upset and the Doctor asked us to speak to the Program Director. We did. I asked her the same questions I had the other Doctors. This time I felt like I was being spun. She said that she did not feel my son would suffer long term effects. I asked her how obvious the brain wave test was that he failed. The Program Director stated that she looked at the test and that there was not much difference in the waves between his left and right ears. This stunned me because two other Audiologist said it was very obvious.
I had done some internet research and read that if the Auditory nerve goes unstimulated it begins to deteriorate. I asked the Program Director about this and she said that it would take more than a couple of years to do any damage to his hearing. I must have asked her 50 different questions and I feel like I got no direct answers. Very frustrated!!! :mad:
Today I scheduled an appointment with an ENT at a private practice. Hopefully I will get the unbiased truth. But the appt is 3 weeks away. I want answers now!
Anyone that can shed some light on this is very much appreciated. I would like to know about the deterioration. Could his hearing have gotten worse in the last 2 years without the hearing aid? I asked for another brain wave test to compare the results to his one at 5 months and was spun on that also.
Please Help!