Anyone have any glue ear knowledge?

[Ledkr]

Dd2 is 2 and was born with a cleft palate which was successfully repaired.
She failed her hearing tests as a tiny baby and was referred to a specialist where she was diagnosed with glue ear and "slight low level hearing loss" the dr didn't seem to think we needed to do anything but monitor.
I have struggled with her behaviour at times and she has only recently started to sleep through. It's hard to tell about her hearing as she's 2.5 so obviously often ignores me. She is wilfull and stubborn and often refuses to do as she is told. (Normal toddler?)
Her speech has improved a lot lately but I still feel its slightly delayed in comparison to others her age as do nursery. The speech therapist said she was mildly concerned and is going into nursery soon to observe her.
Today she had a hearing test (the one that measures eardrum movement which showed no movement at all but the dr not concerned, asked if she'd had a cold- no she hasn't.
Said to see again in 3 months.
Dies this seem ok to you? I thought that the zero eardrum movement would be a concern but apparently not. She said the last hearing test (a yr ago) showed only slight loss.
Anyone have any experience of this and does this sound ok?

we went through similar with ds3 who is 2.5 years old. failed every single hearing test since birth. had lots of intolerances to Foods too. it's pretty standard to wait and see I think. ds had been seen every three months until today he passed his hearing test completely. last one three months ago there was no movement showing on ear drum test at all.

his speech is also delayed but again they are waiting until he starts nursery to see if it improves

Oh thank you. That's very reassuring to know its a standard response.
How delayed is his speech? Dd can speak fairly well now but has a Louis spence lisp and says d instead of n. we can understand her when others can't.

Bumping

The standard procedure now has changed to a wait and see approach until they get to a certain age, rather than doing grommets early.

I read about the change in recommended approach on here on older threads, if you do a search for "grommets" on past threads here there should be threads about it.

Glue ear is a very common side affect of a cleft palate even after a repair I believe.

DS2 has had 2 palate repairs but still has severe glue ear. He's had numerous grommets and t-tubes and wears hearing aids. I wish the advice had been leave alone when he was 2 as the grommets have caused permanent damage with an almost permanent infection.

Hearing aids do the job for him. He's nearly 10 now and I think unlikely to outgrow it as it is also caused by his chromosome abnormality.

Good luck, but try not to fret if her hearing test was showing only a mild loss though as glue ear causes fluctuating hearing I would want her tested frequently particularly over the winter months, and after any cough / cold.

Hello ledkr -- my DD2 is almost exactly the same age as yours (I was in your AN EDD group under another name) and has mixed hearing loss (profound sensorineural in one ear, possible mild-moderate permanent conductive in the other ear and on-and-off (but mostly on) glue ear since birth layered over the top of those - she has bilateral BTE aids at the moment) and a significant language delay so I've been in a LOT of audiology appointments .

Firstly, waiting three months after first getting a flat tympanometry reading is perfectly standard because it does fluctuate a lot. And the research suggests that in the majority of cases "watchful waiting" while using hearing aids will have better long-term results than grommets even if the glue ear doesn't improve.

I'd potentially be concerned about the "slight low level hearing loss", to be honest, given that it's combined with a speech delay -- did they ever tell you what level that was? Even a very slight loss can have a big impact when acquiring speech. Did they do a full hearing test today or just the tympanometry? In your position I'd probably push the question of hearing aids at your next appointment if they don't. It's good that you're already in the SLT system

It's worth registering with the NDCS, as well -- they have some very useful publications, including a good leaflet on glue ear, and a helpful parents' forum.

And do the standard hearing-impaired stuff: keep background noise to a minimum, don't mumble, don't cover your mouth while talking, don't stand so that you are backlit while talking, make sure you have DD's attention before you try to convey any important information, check that she's understood what you are saying after you've said it.

Some links that may help - the watchful waiting for 3 months seems to be standard

NCDS glue ear

Surgical Management of Glue Ear - Nice Guidelines Not saying you'll go down the grommets route at all but it details the 'watchful waiting' bit.

Teachers guide I know your lo isn't in school but this has loads of useful things for nursery too, I gave multiple copies to our nursery

For behaviour and communication we found baby signing working really well - even using one hand to count down from 5 if you want them to stop doing something, if you catch their eye (it works now and looks like a jedi mind trick to our friends as they actually still respond to it)

Def stick with the speech and language, we were initially declined any because ds's hearing was poor and they felt he wouldn't benifit from it until he could hear.. he is 4 (at school) and can't say n and g sounds and does some fronting subsitution (cat is tat for example) but definitely getting better

and get copies all all audiology reports and hearing tests, if it becomes an on going thing its a good idea to be able to track it and understand what 'mild loss' (which is the same as walking around with your fingers in your ears) actually looks like so you can explain it to nursery and then school in the future (and even the SALT because ime they don't know much about audiograms and because its invisible School 'forget') The NCDS can help with that and give great advice.

Tried to reply to this earlier but Battery died on my phone!

DS3 didnt say his first word until Jan this year, hes been in speech therapy since Jan too. He has come alone massively in the last few weeks. Putting together words now to form sentences (kind of) Things like "mummy pick daddy up work" He cant say his brothers names and calls Adam Aaa and Matthew Mash! He is very cute though and learning new words daily now :)