Hearing Test for Children in Melbourne

Hearing Test for Children in Melbourne

Start the 2017 School Year with a Hearing Test for Children

With the beginning of the new school year approaching, the school holiday period makes for a convenient time to book your children in for a hearing test – particularly if they are beginning school for the first time. If your child does present with hearing problems, it can often be beneficial to identify those problems now with a hearing test rather than later in their schooling when the hearing problem may have been dismissed as a ‘learning difficulty’. When you want to book a hearing test for children in Melbourne, get in touch with Acute Hearing.

Potential Indicators of Hearing Loss in Children

There are several obvious signals that could indicate your child might be living with some degree of hearing loss. We would suggest booking your child in for a hearing test in Melbourne if they:

• Fail to respond when someone calls their name
• Show a drop in school grades (often a sign that they cannot hear the teacher)
• Talk too loudly
• Have the television volume up too high
• Complain of experiencing a high pitched ringing sound in their ear (often a symptom of tinnitus)
• Mispronounce certain words
• Display behaviours that might be seen as inattentive

A qualified audiologist can administer a specifically designed hearing test for children that will diagnose whether there is hearing loss and the degree to which hearing loss is present.

What Does a Diagnostic Hearing Test for Children Involve?

The nature of the diagnostic hearing test will often depend on the age of the child, as children should be able to meet certain hearing ‘benchmarks’ during their growth and development. For toddlers and younger children, the audiologist might use a simple test like shaking a rattle and observing the child’s response. Older children might be assessed using a tool such as an audiometer, which is a machine that generates beeps, whistles and other sounds. The child’s response to these sounds, particularly their ability to hear them, will determine the extent of hearing loss. Another potential hearing test for children is auditory brainstem response testing, which gauges the degree of electrical activity in the brain in response to a sound.

Start your child’s schooling by giving them the best possible opportunity for success; book them in for a hearing test in Melbourne these school holidays at Acute Hearing.