2 yr old failed hearing test.....should i be worried

[nutcracker]

2 yr old Ds was reffered at my request just before xmas. I was worried cos it seemed quite hard for me to get him to understand me sometimes.

Anyway we went today and they did the test where there is a box on either side of him and a noise goes off and then a light comes on in the box and he can see a toy.
He didn't seem to be aware of the sounds at all, he only looked when the light came on and the toy moved.
The woman doing the test seemed surprised and said that he didn't seem interested enough in it so they would do another test.

They then did the test where they use that little machine behing them with the funny noises.
He did turn his head to nearly all of them but it sometimes took him a while.

Anyway, went in after to see the doc and she said he had failed. She explained that basically most people speak at 60 decibels but that we need to be able to hear sounds at 30 decibels for speech to develop properly, and he had failed at that level.
She said he had a slight bit of wax in one ear but not enough to make a difference, i have got to use olive oil drops on them and he has got a re-test in april, when she said the weather will be warmer (think she was thinking he may of had a cold but he hasn't).

He has already been reffered for a SALT assessment but i haven't heard anything yet, am hoping he will have had his assesment by the time he has his re-test.

Anyway was just wondering what will happen if he fails the next one ??? anyone know ???

hi nutty, did they check whether it was conductive or sensorineural hearing loss? The have a little machine which they stick in his ear (a bit like an in-ear thermometer) which measures the vibrations of the ear drum to check for glue ear. There is also a test where a sound-making device is held against the skin right behind the ear, if the hearing loss is conductive (i.e. due to a middle ear problem such as glue ear) they child will pass this test but fail the behavioural response one. I would have thought they'll probably do more thorough tests like that next time.
If it is glue ear there are several options, such as grommets, wait-and-see or hearing aids for a little while until he's outgrown the glue ear.
With sensorineural loss the only option really is hearing aids.
Even if he doesn't have a cold at the moment he could still have glue ear - it can linger for many months. HTH.

Thanks geekgirl, they did do the test where they put the thing in his ear yeah but didn't say what the result was, she just sort of gave e the result as a whole i think.

I don't think he has ever had any ear infections so don't think it is glue ear.

The first test that they did, even i could tell that he either had not heard the sounds at all or he had no clue where they were coming from, he just kept waiting for the light to come on, wasn't interested in the sound at all.

Am hoping he will pass next time, but obviously if he doesn't then i will ask lots more questions.
Just anxious to get the SALT assesment now as before his hearing test i thought i was just be nuerotic, but now i'm a bit more worried.

he could still have glue ear - my eldest dd had glue ear and moderate hearing loss (she could only hear sounds over 50dcb) for about 4 months when she was 3 . She'd never had an ear infection either. It just went away on it's own whilst waiting for an appointment with the ENT consultant. Maybe your ds just found it all too boring!

I think he was a bit bored tbh. Once he had seen the toy in the box once, he was like 'well yeah, it's the smae toy'.

Oh well am gonna ring up the salt and chase his appointment up, and tell them he failed his hearing, hopefully that might speed it up a bit.

Thanks for your help geekgirl