Don't think glue ear is normally a problem as young as this. The test to ask about is described below - sorry if the format goes funny.
Testing A Newborn's hearing - TEOAE Testing
More recently, a device capable of checking the hearing of new-borns (by measuring "Transient Evoked Oto-
Acoustic Emissions" or TEOAE's) has been developed.
The inner-most part of each ear contains a structure called the "cochlea". This structure converts the sound
vibrations which arrive at the ear into electrical impulses, and then transmits these electrical impulses via various
nerves to different parts of the brain, where they are "decoded" and made sense of.
In the late 1970's, a man called Kemp discovered that in the healthy ear when sound is heard, there is a discharge
(echo) of sound energy from the cochlea into the ear canal, which could then be detected and quantified with
appropriate equipment. she named this energy (echo) "Oto-Acostic Emissions" (OAE) and since then, a lot more has
been learned about them.
This device measures the transient OAE in response to sounds made by the machine directly into the ear canal. A
deaf ear will not produce this transient OAE - therefore the aim of testing new-borns is so that a deaf child can
receive appropriate help as soon as possible.
If a child "fails" this test, it is repeated once; and checks (including tympanometry) are made to see if there are any
other problems present which could affect hearing. Those who then seem as though they might have a hearing
problem are referred for a further test known as "Auditory Brainstem Response" (ABR) for a definitive diagnosis.
In the UK, this test is being used in a few areas to screen those new-borns who, because of various medical factors,
are at a greater-than-average risk of having hearing problems. One or two more areas are also currently piloting this
test as a universal hearing screening test for all new-borns.
While the objective machine-produced TEOAE tests may be more accurate than the sometimes subjective
distraction testing, they are not (at least yet) 100% perfect in their results. For this reason, their use as a hearing test
for all children both here and in the USA is still unclear.
Additionally, children born with initially normal hearing do sometimes get infections, glue ears and other problems
later in infancy and childhood which can affect hearing.