Abstract
Background
The French newborn hearing screening programme set up in 2014 aims to identify affected children as early as possible to allow appropriate care. Our goal was to evaluate the implementation of this programme at the national level.
Methods
The programme consist in a screening using a test (T1) and a retest (T2) in the maternity hospital in all newborns. In some region, a delayed test (T3) is performed afterwards in children for whom it was not possible to confirm normal hearing. Children suspected of deafness subsequently enter the diagnosis phase. We defined evaluation indicators after stakeholders consultation. We developed a web application to collect aggregated data on live births. We estimated the rate of coverage, refusal, children suspected of hearing loss at the end of the screening phase and the prevalence of bilateral deafness.
Results
In 2015, one year after the initiation of the programme, the coverage rate was already very high (88%) and even more so in 2016 (96%). Parental acceptance was very good (refusal: 0.1%). By the end of 2016, 19 out 27 regions had added a T3. The rate of suspicion of bilateral hearing loss was decreased by using a T3 (1.4% vs 0.9%). Bilateral deafness rate, estimated after a 2-years follow up, was 1.3‰ although it was estimated only on 51.5% of suspected children for whom diagnosis data had been transmitted.
Conclusions
The objective of a 90% coverage set by the French ministry of health has been met after 2 years of operation of the program. T3 appears useful in relieving diagnostic structures from false positives. Our estimated prevalence of bilateral deafness could be more accurate if data collection was improved but is consistent with prevalence reported in North America.
Key messages
The universal newborn hearing screening program has been successfully set up in France in terms of coverage. Future work should focus on improving the collection of follow up data to better characterise diagnosed children.
716 The impact of COVID-19 on the English newborn hearing screening programme – minimising delays in the identification of permanent childhood hearing impairment
