TO STUDY THE INCIDENCE OF SENSORINEURAL HEARING LOSS POST MENINGITIS IN NEONATES

Background:Post meningitis hearing impairment is an important public health problem. Neonatal meningitis is an important cause of mortality and morbidity in neonates in future life. An important consequence is hearing loss. Hearing plays a basic and important role in language, speech and intellectual development. Late detection causes irreversible stunting of the language development potential of the child. Early detection and intervention would help to maximize linguistic competence and literacy development for children who are deaf or hard of hearing. The study of brainstem evoked response audiometry provides an opportunity to evaluate the functional integrity of auditory pathway from inner ear to upper brainstem. Aim:This study was conducted to determine the incidence of sensorineural hearing loss following meningitis in neonates. Material and Methods:The present study was conducted in the Department of Pediatrics, Government Medical College Srinagar. All the patients,Term neonates with CSF culture proven bacterial meningitis. , were referred to the Department of ENT, SMHS Hospital Srinagar, of the institution for thorough ENT checkup, to exclude any ear pathology and BERA (Brainstem Evoked Response Audiometry). Results:In our study total number of cases were 87. Majority of our studied children i.e. 47 (54%) were < days of age whereas 40 (46%) children were 8-28 days of aged. The mean age of our study patients was 15.7+3.71.Out of 87 patients in our study, male predominance was observed with 55.2% males versus 44.8% females with a male to female ratio of 1.2:1. Hearing loss was observed in 11 (12.6%) of our study children.Bilateral hearing loss was seen in 5 of the 11 children (5.7%) while as unilateral hearing loss was observed in 6 of the 11 children (6.9%). Out of a total of 11 (12.6%) patients who had hearing loss, 6 (6.9%) were having mild hearing loss, followed by 3 (3.4%) children with profound hearing loss while as moderate and severe hearing loss was observed in 1 (1.1%) patients each. Conclusion: Hearing loss is not a rare complication asociated with meningitis in neonates, early detection and appropriate treatment is needed to prevent language , speech and intellecual damage.