Effectiveness of neonatal hearing screening in identifying hearing impairment : a systematic review

Abstract

Background and Aim Otoacoustic emissions (OAE) and auditory brainstem response (ABR) are the most common used methods to identify the childhood hearing impairment under the universal neonatal hearing screening programme. According to the American Academy of Paediatrics, both OAE and ABR are the recognized screening to identify the hearing impairment. Nowadays, ABR rather than OAE serves as the gold standard in identify the neonatal hearing impairment. This study was preformed to evaluate the sensitivity and specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value of the OAE by using the gold standard of AABR tests. Methods A systematic review was performed to evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of the OAE compare with the ABR test. Research was conducted in the international database. The review was from Jan 1990 to May 2015. The quality of included studies was evaluated with the strengthening the reporting of observational studies in epidemiology (STROBE) checklist. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value were calculated. Results A total of 374 studies were found; 54 studies were investigated in full and 5 studies possessed the inclusion criteria. Result showed that the sensitivity value (0.45-0.88), specificity (0.38- 0.83), the positive predictive value (0.13-0.27), negative predictive value (0.71-0.98). The range of the sensitivity and specificity value is wide. However, OAE test showed a high significant sensitivity among the studies which performed the OAE test after 24 hours after birth. Evaluated the risk factors related to these results also discussed.