Part of Child Health Interoperability (CHI) implementation guide for health visiting services
Newborn hearing screening
Newborn hearing screening
The NHS newborn hearing screening programme aims to identify moderate, severe and profound deafness and hearing impairment in newborn babies. Early identification of hearing impairment gives children a better chance of developing speech and language skills, and of making the most of social and emotional interaction from an early age. If giving birth in hospital, parents may be offered a newborn hearing test for their baby before they are discharged.
The programme offers 2 types of tests:
- Automated Otoacoustic Emission (AOAE)
- Automated Auditory Brainstem Response (AABR)
Messages received through this release will mean that when the health screeners complete the test and save the record, the screening results will be published directly to be viewed by parents, health visitors and the CHIS. This will reduce the need to write in a paper red book or print results. This will improve the availability of information to clinicians and improve the decision-making and effectiveness of interventions.
Data fields available in this message
This table lists the data fields in the newborn hearing screening message.
| DCH FHIR event | Description |
|---|---|
| Date or time | The date the screening test took place |
| Location | The location that is recorded as to where the newborn hearing screening examination took place |
| Performing professional | Name of the professional performing the screening |
| SDS role job name | The job associated with the person |
| Hearing test results | The outcome of the individual screening test performed |
| Summary outcomes | Overall outcome of the newborn hearing screening |
| Comments | Supporting text may be given recovering regarding the screening test, outcome and actions taken. |
What benefits can be achieved
We have provided a table to help you identify the potential benefits of receiving newborn hearing screening results via NEMS. The level of benefits depends on on your current processes.
| Do you currently? | With NEMS | Which means | What may be impacted? | Possible measures before and after |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Receive hearing results or access SMART hearing to extract results | You will receive hearing screening results directly in your IT system |
Removes the need to upload results in your system reduces the number of errors |
Time taken to process results timeliness of data completeness of data |
time taken for checking time taken to upload missing results |
| Get results for out of area babies | You will only receive results for children you are responsible for | No longer sort or filter out results for children that are not yours | Time taken Timeliness of data | Time taken |
| Failsafe hearing results and chase missing results | You will receive for your cohort on a daily basis from SMART4 hearing |
No longer check against SMART4 database Reduce missing results | Time taken | Time taken for failsafing |
| Forward results on to health visiting services or rekey information on their behalf | You may be able to stop notifiying which may free up time and health visiting may receive information sooner |
No longer forward results to health visitor | Time taken Timeliness of data | Time taken |
Last edited: 30 January 2025 4:29 pm