Neonatal hearing screening to prevent childhood deafness, Dhulikhel Hospital
Situation:
The healthcare system in Nepal suffers from extreme underfunding. Government efforts focus on basic care in the form of health posts. However, these are often lacking in rural areas. Dhulikhel Hospital and its 18 health posts provide medical care for people in a catchment area of 1.9 million inhabitants.
Objectives:
The project aims to identify and treat hearing impairment in newborns in the catchment area of Dhulikhel Hospital and its 18 outreach clinics with 1,9 million inhabitants in order to promote the child's linguistic and social development before school age. Neonatal hearing screening is essential for early detection and treatment.
- The hearing-impaired children will have been detected in the catchment area and will have undergone treatment and rehabilitation
- The hearing-impaired children will have received hearing assistance and therapy and therefor, they will have learned to speak and to communicate with others, non-hearing-impaired people
- 3 audiologists, 3 technicians and 2 ENT doctors will have been trained
- Purchase of screening- and diagnostic ENT equipment
- Screening of newborns, medical visit with otoscope, treatment of ear infection
- AABR screening for hearing impaired children
- ABR screening for confirmed hearing impairment
- Giving high gain hearing aid
- Giving cochlear implant surgery
- Speech therapy will accompany the high gain hearing aid and cochlear implant
- Training of audiologist and technicians in audiological testing and speech therapy, train doctors in cochlear implant technique
- Teaching of the parents of hearing-impaired children
- Setting up of a Tracking Centre
- Collaboration with Kathmandu Medical University and make Neonatal hearing screening, hearing aid and cochlear implant part of the ENT curriculum
- Collaboration with the Nepalese Health Department and make assistance for hearing aid and cochlear implants part of the national health services
The aim of the project is to include newborn hearing screening in the Nepalese government's healthcare program. The Nepalese healthcare system will provide hearing aids or cochlear implants to hearing impaired children under the age of 7 and support speech therapy.
Hearing impairment is a serious problem in Nepal, 16.6% of the total population suffers from hearing loss which is one of the highest in Asia. Screening all the newborns in an area of 1,9 million inhabitants is new. The tracking of all the results and the presentation to the Nepalese Health department will encourage the Government to incorporate neonatal hearing screening into the national health plan.
