Egypt’s Ministry of Health and Population announced conducting a hearing screening for 3.856 million children, as part of the initiative of President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, for early detection and treatment of hearing impairment in newborns.
Hossam Abdel Ghaffar, the official spokesperson for the Ministry of Health and Population, said that 219,384 children were referred for re-examination through a confirmatory test, in the same unit a week after the first examination.
He added that, after the second test, 23,817 children were transferred to hospitals and the 30 referral centers nationwide, in order to assess the condition with higher accuracy, start treatment or install a hearing aid, or transfer the child to undergo a cochlear implant for those whose state requires it.
Abdel Ghaffar pointed out that the number of audiological examination centers for children, starting from the day of birth until the age of 28 days, has increased to 3,500 health units in all governorates of the republic.
He further noted that 8,262 non-Egyptian children residing in Egypt were examined, as part of the initiative.
Abdel Ghaffar clarified that the child’s failure to pass the second test, in most cases, does not mean that he has hearing loss. Still, it is an indication that the child needs advanced examinations in the referral centers of the initiative.
He stressed that early detection of hearing impairment or loss avoids hearing impairment and facilitates treatment opportunities, in addition to avoiding speech problems that can cause psychological crises for the child.
Moreover, Ahmed Mostafa, Executive Director of the President’s Initiative for the Early Detection and Treatment of Weakness and Hearing Loss in Newborns, said that the birth certificate was recently updated, and the audio examination box was included in it, where registration is done through the birth database and the vaccination file, with the aim of creating a complete file for the child includes his health condition.
He added that nursing staff were trained to work on the acoustic emission device in health units, in addition to training data entry personnel from health units, in all governorates of the republic, to record newborn data on the initiative’s website.
