The risk of neurological impairment of infants failing audiological screening by Crib-O-Gram.

The risk of neurological impairment of those infants failing the Crib-O-Gram hearing screening test was studied. Of the 1,727 infants who were at risk with hearing loss and who were screened by Crib-O-Gram at nurseries for the newborn and premature, 292 (16.9%) failed the screening test. As a control group, whose developmental prognosis was compared with that of the group which failed, 292 infants were selected whose birth dates were very close to the birth dates of those infants failing the test. All of them had passed their Crib-O-Gram screening test. After more than 9 months of follow-up, 28 neurological deficit children were detected in the group failing the test. In the control group, there were 12 neurological deficit children. There was a statistical significance between the two groups (p less than 0.01). Of the 292 infants in the group which failed the test, 231 eventually passed a screening while 43 infants did not. Follow-up examinations of these 43 infants revealed that 15 (34.9%) had neurological deficits. These results show that infants who fail the hearing screening by Crib-O-Gram may have a high probability of neurological deficit and should receive careful follow-up both neurologically and audiologically.