When will the baby be able to hear you? How to determine that a child has hearing impairment: recommendations for parents When a newborn begins to hear well

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A newborn baby can sleep even in loud noise, and this does not bother him at all. But parents wonder whether the child can hear at all. In this article we will look at the characteristics of hearing in newborns, as well as methods for determining it at home.

Formation of auditory function

You might be surprised, but Babies begin to hear in the womb. The hearing organs are formed early - as early as the 5th week of pregnancy, the rudiments of future ears, or more precisely, the inner ear, are formed. At 7 weeks, the middle ear is formed, and then the auricle. The fetus's ears become hard only shortly before birth.

Important for the ability to hear, the inner ear completes its formation at about 19 weeks. And even after birth, the auricle continues to remain quite soft, the ear canal is narrow, and this will correct itself only by the first year of life.

Babies begin to hear the first sounds in their mother’s belly after 14 weeks.. But while these sounds are more reminiscent of the hearing of a reptile, the fetus picks up the vibrations that accompany the sound waves. As the inner ear completes its formation and the labyrinth hardens, the ability to hear better appears. This happens after the 20th week; by the 26th week of pregnancy, the baby in the stomach hears almost like us, but adjusted for the fact that it is still in an aquatic environment.

He hears his mother’s heart beating and blood flowing through her vessels, how her intestines work. He hears her voice and quickly gets used to it. Sounds from outside begin to interest the baby only in the last weeks of pregnancy. The child hears the music that sounds in the mother’s headphones, but only if the headphones are placed directly on the stomach. If they are on the mother’s ears, the child cannot hear the sounds.

The baby is born hearing. If a newborn’s vision is very imperfect, and the baby perceives only blurry, indistinct spots, then everything is fine with his hearing.

Of course, provided that during the process of the formation and development of hearing organs in the prenatal period of development, no errors or problems arose that could affect the state of hearing.

Screening after birth

In the first days of life (usually after the second day) in the maternity hospital, all newborns undergo a special test - testing their hearing abilities or audio screening. A special device is used to record the response of hair cells to sound stimuli. The second screening examination is recommended to be carried out at the age of 1 month, 3 months, or six months.

It is difficult to say how reliable such a study is. If it provided the most accurate data, it would be possible to diagnose hearing pathologies within a year.

In the meantime, most cases of minor sensorineural hearing loss and unilateral hearing loss or deafness (if one ear cannot hear) are detected much later. That is, a child who has successfully passed audio screening may well turn out to be hard of hearing.

In the maternity hospital they use the delayed otoacoustic emission method. A portable device with a small, thin, flexible probe is called an audiometer. One part of the probe is placed in the baby's ear. The device sends sounds into the ear through a probe. Hair cells in the inner ear detect them and amplify them if the child hears them. If not, then the hair cells do not receive the signal, there is no impulse. To obtain more accurate results, it is considered optimal if the baby is fed and sleeping.

In the extract from the maternity hospital, if you look closely, you can find the following designations: D (+) = S (+). This means that the child was successfully screened for both the right and left ears. He hears.

If instead of pluses there is a minus, the screening showed the absence of a reaction of hair cells, and therefore the child will definitely be prescribed an additional examination.

Screening of premature babies has its own nuances. They undergo an acoustic examination not on the second day, given the immaturity of all organs and systems, including the hearing organs, but on any day after 2-4 weeks of life.

At risk for possible pathologies are children born to deaf or hard of hearing parents, as well as children born from a pregnancy during which the woman suffered from infectious viral diseases, especially if this happened in the early stages.

How to check at home?

All parents of newborns, one way or another, try to independently understand how the baby sees and hears. At home, a method such as observing the child’s reaction to sounds will help.. The behavioral method is only approximate and inaccurate, because if some deviations are detected, it cannot show how significant the hearing loss is and what caused it. But this is not required from a home inspection.

Parents can check their hearing themselves in order to consult a doctor if they receive questionable or unsatisfactory results. No need to wait for your child to grow up. For normal mental development and speech development, it is important to hear, and therefore hearing correction is possible in infancy: children are fitted with hearing aids (ear correctors), and operations are performed to restore the auricle if there are defects of the outer ear.

There are many ways to help a child, but help will be more useful if it is provided as early as possible.

If the baby is already a month old, you can try using the behavioral method. It is based on the baby's specific reactions to sounds. It is important that the child is at rest, dry and well-fed.

First, make different sounds from the right ear, and then from the left. Start by clapping your hands from a distance of about half a meter. Then check how your baby perceives quieter sounds, for example, the sound of a rattle (choose a toy with an initially quiet sound). High frequencies can be checked using semolina, which the mother can pour into an empty metal jar. Shake such a jar close to the ear - the baby can only catch the high-frequency sound of the cereal at close range.

How to understand that a child perceives a particular sound:

• he becomes animated by the sound with synchronized waves of his arms and legs;
• he freezes and tries to discover the source of the strange sound;
• the baby opens his eyes wide and changes his facial expression;
• The baby's breathing frequency and depth changes.

Home hearing tests are never given to children who are ill, have colic, or are teething., if the baby is hungry or hasn’t had enough sleep. Any discomfort that the baby feels increases the likelihood of an incorrect behavioral response to sounds.

In the first month of life, children almost do not distinguish between low frequencies; for them, the high frequency range is more familiar. If tests are carried out on children aged 3 months and older, then such an important sign as turning the head towards the sound source is added to the list of reactions.

A hearing test technique based on playing different sounds by frequency is called the Kalmykova method. For such a test, you will need three plastic containers, which are proposed to be filled by a third with semolina, buckwheat, and peas. These will be high, mid and low frequencies. To check, you will have to involve your dad or grandmother as assistants. While one distracts the child’s attention with a bright toy, an unusual object, the second, half a meter from the right ear, and then from the left ear shakes a can. They start with semolina (that is, with high-frequency sounds), then they take buckwheat, and lastly, peas. Between changing cans, take a break for a couple of minutes.

The test is considered passed successfully if the child, even without being distracted from the toy, reacts (even briefly) to the sound of cereals in jars. He may freeze for a second, turn his head and look at the jar, begin to look for the source of the sound with his eyes, and change his facial expression. If there is no reaction at all, you should show the child to an ENT specialist and an audiologist.

The condition of the baby immediately after birth raises a number of questions and concerns among young parents. Why does he react poorly to noises - for example, does he not wake up when a vacuum cleaner is running in the next room? Why doesn't he notice when someone enters the room? And in general, is everything okay and when do newborns begin to see and hear? In fact, as a rule, there is no real cause for concern, and now we will find out why.

In the mother's belly it is comfortable, warm and dark, and suddenly the baby finds himself in a new world, full of movement, light, colors, sounds. Nature is very wise: it protects a newly born person from stress associated with a sudden “change of environment.” The development of all functions (vision, hearing, motor activity) should occur naturally over several months. And how correctly this happens, in some cases only an experienced doctor can say.

Features of hearing development

The baby already has hearing in utero, at 16-17 weeks. Experiments prove that children hear both voices and music perfectly, and after birth the phenomenon of “recognition” of melodies or even poetry is observed. "Recognition" usually manifests itself in animated movements. Most quickly, the baby begins to recognize his mother and the timbre of her voice, because it is this voice that he is most accustomed to.

In the first days of life, children notice only high volume (and do not pay attention to the TV or vacuum cleaner, to low-volume conversations and other not very pronounced “signals”). Therefore, the question of whether newborn children hear can be answered this way: their hearing is fine, they just do not respond to all stimuli.

Rattles and other objects that make not too quiet sounds, as well as light clapping of your hands near the ear, are a good way to test your baby's hearing. The main thing is not to overdo it and not to scare the baby. When talking to him, change the pace, volume of speech and intonation and you will see:

• movements of arms and legs;
• changes in facial expression;
• movements of the head or “search” with the eyes;
• flinching or freezing.

Crying or convulsive movements usually appear when sounds frighten the child, for example, an unfamiliar voice nearby, loud conversation, and especially screaming. Do not be alarmed by the baby’s “inappropriate” (too sharp) reaction, he just has very heightened sensitivity, and this is normal. At least in the first month, all family members and guests should behave more quietly, and direct communication with the baby should be calm and even.

So, when do newborns begin to hear? Of course, right away, but the child begins to turn his head consciously, looking for sources of sounds, by the end of the third month. If he is very passionate about something, he will not react to any stimuli. This is also normal.

Talk to your baby more, sing or play children's songs, tell poems and short fairy tales. This, in addition to the development of hearing, lays the foundation for the formation of speech.

Features of vision formation

Rest assured, children begin to see immediately after birth, although numerous studies have proven that at this time vision is blurry: adaptation to unusual conditions occurs. Don't worry if your baby rarely opens his eyes or mostly squints. And there are also babies who, already in the first hours of life, look “surprised” at the world around them.

The visual acuity of a newborn is much weaker than that of adults: 0.005 - 0.015. In the first months it grows to 0.01-0.03. This is due to the gradual formation of the centers of the brain, eyeball and retina. The part of the retina where 100% vision is achieved, 1.0 (the so-called macula macula), is not yet available in a recently born baby.

This is how a newborn’s vision is formed and what stages of development visual function goes through over time.

When “establishing” eye contact, hold the baby vertically: in this position, his gaze focuses better. Even when the newborn begins to see well, do not rush - wait until he concentrates. Your face (or the object that you are showing) should be at a distance of about 20 cm from the child’s eyes. When communicating, try not to change your facial expression or overall appearance too dramatically, including your hairstyle; do not even take off your glasses if you wear them. - to look familiar to the baby and not worry him.

Binocular vision is formed from the sixth week of life. The baby begins to see consciously only from the fourth month. Until this time, he is unable to use both eyes at the same time, causing him to appear to be squinting or to have his eyes “wandering” independently of each other.

Possible problems

So, you should not immediately jump to conclusions that your baby has poor hearing or vision. But it must be remembered that there are cases in which this assumption may be true.

Hearing problems in the baby (deafness, hearing loss) are possible during pathological childbirth or if the mother during pregnancy:

• suffered from rubella, measles;
• was addicted to alcohol and drugs;
• took drugs with toxic effects (antibiotics).

Be wary if your child:

• does not show anxiety at unexpected, loud sounds;
• does not respond to your voice by changing behavior or facial expressions;
• at 4 months does not pay attention to people talking or to a musical toy;
• often pulls his ears (possibly high blood pressure, infection).

Poor vision in a newborn (or blindness) can occur if the mother during pregnancy:

• had rubella (risk of congenital cataracts);
• suffered from toxemia/toxoplasmosis/toxocariasis.

In the fourth week of life, the baby should already focus his gaze on objects for a short time. Check your vision this way: close your baby's right eye and show the toy, then do the same with the left eye.

Until six months of age, children squint a little - this is natural. But if this look persists after 6 months, be sure to consult a doctor. Signs of strabismus should never be ignored: without adequate treatment, blindness can develop.

If parents have even the slightest suspicion that something is going wrong, they should seek advice from a pediatrician and relevant specialists - an ophthalmologist, an otolaryngologist. They know when a newborn child begins to see and when his hearing develops, and they will notice developmental deviations in time.

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The difficult time is over. A small bag is snuffling in your arms. Now comes the moment when you ask yourself: “Is everything okay with my little one?”

A child sees and hears from the cradle

During the first weeks after birth, your baby is not as indifferent as it might seem at first glance. He may sleep, cry, and mess his diapers much more than he eats. In reality, everything functions for him, and he hears sounds and smells that are inherent in a new world for him.

It's hard for parents to know when baby starts to feel, but if you pay close attention, you'll see how he reacts to lights, noise, loud music and raised voices.

Let's figure it out, when does a newborn begin to see and hear?

In the first weeks of life, the baby can see at a distance of 20-30 cm. If he is in the arms of his mother or father, watch him, he will definitely look at you and also focus on distant objects. Babies are very sensitive to bright light, so it is better if the children's room has dim, soft light. a child begins from his first days. After he looks at mom and dad, just bright spots and contrasting patterns, he will look at the movement of things, at bright and loud toys, all this will attract and hold his gaze much longer than before.

Although your toddler's vision is functional, it still requires some

easy adjustments, especially when it comes to focusing. you even
It may seem that the baby's eyes are slightly squinting. Don't worry, this is normal: your little baby's eye muscles will continue to strengthen over the next few months. But if you feel like your baby's eyes are crossing more than normal or are cloudy, be sure to tell your doctor. Hang toys of bright colors above the baby's crib; he is interested in everything when he begins to see and hear. Your newborn will look at new places with interest if you provide him with changes in the landscape more often.

What about the baby's hearing?

The baby begins to hear when he is still in his mother’s womb. He feels his mother’s heart beating, his stomach growls, he even hears her voice and understands the sounds of others too.

After the baby is born, the sounds of the outside world become loud and clear to him. When a newborn begins to see and hear, he may be startled by the unexpected barking of a dog nearby or the noise of a vacuum cleaner. Try to pay attention to how the baby reacts to your mom and dad, especially familiar to him, and at this time he feels protection and calm. He already knows when he is going to be fed, put to bed, and bathed, as the child’s development takes place. A newborn is very easily startled by loud knocking or noise. To prevent this from happening, make sure that your family is attentive to this factor.

We've dealt with questions about when a newborn begins to see and hear, but he still has so much to learn, and the family needs to help him cope with it all. After all, no one knows the baby as well as his parents.

Our expert - audiologist at polyclinic No. 3, UDP of the Russian Federation Andrey Izosimov.

This story is real. On September 1, in one of the regular Moscow schools, the teacher, before starting the lesson, asked the students to listen to the mother of their classmate. Mom showed the kids a small object: “This is my son’s hearing aid. Without it he can't hear. You can carefully examine it, and I will tell you how it works.” The guys have a genuine interest in the curiosity. And even respect for its owner. The boy is no longer ashamed of his illness. He, who had recently been doomed to isolation, now had the opportunity to communicate with his peers on equal terms. And all because the mother realized in time that her son had problems with his hearing, and did everything to return the child to the world of sounds.

From the first days

Here they are - the long-awaited first words that the baby says: “Mom, dad, lala...”. One toddler quickly masters the wisdom of communication, while another child finds the world of words more difficult. And one in a thousand newborns stubbornly remains silent, and adults sometimes have no idea that the reason for this is the hearing impairment with which the child was born. If parents do not take decisive measures from the first months of the baby’s life, then the child will never hear human speech, which means he will not learn to speak.

How to suspect in time that your baby has hearing problems?

There are many reasons for hearing loss. The baby may have difficulty hearing:

● if he was born prematurely and/or weighed less than 1.5 kg at birth;

● if immediately after birth the child was unable to breathe on his own or received an intracranial injury during childbirth;

● if during pregnancy the mother suffered a dangerous infection (rubella, influenza, herpes, cytomegalovirus, toxoplasmosis);

● if the mother was treated with ototoxic drugs (some antibiotics, diuretics) during pregnancy;

● if hearing loss is a hereditary disease in the family;

● for genetic disorders.

What to pay attention to

How to test a baby's hearing? Doctors have not yet learned how to determine whether a child can hear in the womb. But methods exist that make it possible to accurately tell almost immediately after birth whether the baby can hear. In Scandinavia, for example, all newborns are screened for hearing loss by recording otoacoustic emissions. This is an objective diagnostic method, so it can be used to study hearing even in the smallest children. Unfortunately, our country does not yet have the practice of testing hearing of all newborns. Therefore, parents themselves need to be attentive and watch the baby:

● Does the baby flinch from loud noises in the first 2–3 weeks of life?

● Does the child at one and a half to six months react by screaming or opening his eyes wide to sharp sounds?

● Does he roar at two to four months? Does this humming turn into babbling by 4-5 months?

● Does he develop new (emotional) babbling when his parents arrive?

● Does the baby develop any new sounds at 8–10 months?

If, after such observations, parents are alarmed by something, they should show the baby to the doctor.

Consequence of diseases

If in doubt, consult a specialist with an older child - he, too, is in for trouble: hearing can be affected by illness (meningitis, encephalitis, severe forms of measles and mumps), frequent otitis media (and inflammation of the middle ear sometimes occurs without noticeable symptoms), from medications, giving complications to the ears, from traumatic brain injuries.

Technological progress also makes its contribution, testing our ears with exorbitant loads. Sensitive auditory cells in the inner ear die from excessively loud and prolonged sounds. The roar of the street alone, which does not stop day or night, is almost 90 decibels. What can we say about the deafening roar of a jet plane (120 decibels), the subway, or a rock concert? The ears are begging for mercy. But we don’t hear their pleas and add music flowing from the headphones of the ubiquitous player...

A survey conducted in the Moscow region revealed hearing loss in more than half of repeat year students! Children turned into laggards simply because they were not examined on time.

Cartoon model

As soon as the doctor has diagnosed hearing damage and admitted that neither treatment nor surgery will solve the problem (and in 90% of cases, alas, this is exactly the case), you should immediately contact a hearing prosthetist. He will select a high-quality hearing aid for your child and adjust it precisely in accordance with the individual characteristics of hearing loss. Only then will a child with hearing problems be able to hear, learn to speak, develop normally, and then be able to study in a regular school. But hurry: your child should be fitted with hearing aids as early as possible, immediately after the diagnosis is made (ideally before six months of age).

The most favorable period for language acquisition is from 7–12 months to 3.5–4 years. The later, the worse the result, the more efforts of parents and teachers of the deaf will be required for the child to master speech. If hearing correction is delayed until the age of five, teaching a child to speak coherently will be almost impossible.

Of course, the baby needs a special device: as durable and light as possible, invisible to others, so that the child does not feel embarrassed to wear it. Or, on the contrary, bright, colorful, decorated with cartoon characters, so that it becomes the envy of peers. These are the models offered to children by companies specializing in the production of modern digital technology. Experts have their own requirements for a hearing device: it must be powerful, have a wide frequency range, and display sound as accurately as possible. After all, the better the device, the faster and better the child will learn to hear and speak, the brighter and more full-bodied his life will be.

Young parents Anything that casts doubt on the normal development of the baby is alarming. They are especially alarmed when the baby is already 3-4 months old, but he does not react to sounds, does not turn his head in the direction where the TV is on and does not wake up when a sharp sound is made after some object falls to the floor.

In fact child sees and hears from the first days of birth. He is so susceptible to external stimuli that, while awake, he shudders from unexpected sounds, and when he hears his mother’s voice, he joyfully begins to move his legs, clenching his fists. But newborn babies sleep soundly, not reacting to loud sounds. At the same time, it is interesting that they wake up more often from their mother’s whisper than from the sound of their mother’s loud voice.

Research by scientists has shown child begins to distinguish between the voices of mom and dad already in the last months of pregnancy. Already in the womb, he is able to distinguish between music and fairy tales, which his parents most often listen to and read. Therefore, after birth, babies fall asleep best to lullabies sung to them by their parents, music and fairy tales familiar to them before birth.

Aged 3.5 - 4 months babies should begin to turn their heads in the direction from which the noise is heard. If such a reaction is not observed, parents begin to worry and try to independently determine whether their baby hears or not? The simplest test of a child's hearing, which all parents usually resort to, is a reaction to their voice or to the sound of a musical toy.

For hearing tests Most often, one of the parents takes the child in his arms, and the other calls him by name from a distance of several meters. Or one parent sits with a child in his arms, and the other quietly approaches him from behind and starts a musical toy.

IN 4 months baby reacts to the sound of toys, the voice of parents and extraneous noise equally in both the right and left ears. With normal hearing, a 4-month-old child should show reactions to any sound signal in the form of searching for the source of the sound, turning the head, freezing and blinking. However, when the same sounds are heard repeatedly, the baby’s reaction quickly fades away, so parents should not think that there is something wrong with the child’s hearing if he ignores synchronously repeated sounds.

U young inexperienced parents causes fear when they call the baby by name from some distance, and he continues to play with his rattles or look at the wallpaper. In fact, children begin to call out their name only at the age of 6-7 months, and you should only worry about the baby not responding to his name if he is already one year old and he does not turn his head in your direction when you call him by name.

Doctors have not yet learned how to determine whether he can hear baby in the womb, but in developed foreign countries, for example, in Scandinavia, the hearing organs of all newborns are examined by recording otaacoustic emissions. This method helps to identify hearing loss in children from the first days of life, but a similar technique is not yet practiced in our country. We recommend that parents themselves be attentive when caring for their newborn baby and observe his reaction.

The sooner parents If problems with a child’s hearing are identified, the greater the chance that proper treatment will protect him from hearing loss. You should definitely show your baby to an ENT doctor if he:

At the age of 2-3 weeks, while awake, does not flinch from loud sounds and does not “freeze” when hearing the familiar voice of mom or dad;
- at the age of 1-3 months does not turn his head towards the mother’s voice;
- at the age of 4 months does not respond to the sounds of a musical toy, does not turn his head towards the sound and does not babble;
- at 1.5 - 6 months, while awake, does not begin to cry loudly or does not open his eyes wide to the sharp sound of a falling object or other roar;
- does not hum at 2-4 months:

At 4-5 months he does not babble and does not react joyfully to the appearance of his parents;
- at 6 months does not make any sounds, is constantly silent;
- at 8-10 months does not try to pronounce individual sounds;
- at 1 year of age does not comply with parents’ requests;
- at 2 years old does not pronounce words or phrases.

Check your hearing baby over 1 year old, who has already begun to pronounce words, it is recommended in the following way: give the child a soft toy and in a normal voice ask him to show where his legs, ears and eyes are. Then repeat this request in a whisper, first near the child, and then from a distance of 6 meters from him. If a child fulfills a request only when you ask him to do something loudly, and ignores everything said in a whisper, then it makes sense to have his hearing checked by a doctor.

In the second year of life kids should already hear individual words spoken in a whisper from a distance of 6 meters, although the reason for the lack of reaction to a whisper may also be factors such as enthusiastic play with a new toy, change of location, first steps, delicious food, etc. Each child grows and develops differently, and how the parents care for him and how much time they spend with him determines how he will react to their whispers and call out his name.

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