4 Reasons You Need to Address Your Baby's Hearing Loss Immediately

While your baby is in the hospital, they will undergo an infant hearing test. If based on that test you are informed that your baby has hearing loss, you need to take action right away. Getting your baby help and hearing aids as soon as possible can be hugely beneficial to your baby. Here are five reasons why you shouldn't wait to process this new information but should instead act right away.

#1: New Connections Are Constantly Being Made in Your Child's Brain

When your child is an infant, their brain is making the connections that they will need to grow and learn every day. Your child's brain is constantly firing and learning. Even when your baby is doing simple things like eating and sleeping, their brain is busy growing the connections they need to thrive in life. Each day that your child is not able to hear, those are connections that your child is losing out on.

#2: Your Child's Auditory Cortex Needs to Be Stimulated

In order for your child to learn how to both speak and talk, your child has to be constantly exposed to auditory simulation. Even when your child is an infant, they are taking in all the sights and sounds around them and using that information to create connections in their brain that will help them talk and speak in the future and that help them respond to you right now. If your child is not able to hear properly, your child's auditory cortex will not get the workout and stimulation that it needs to grow.

#3: Each Sound Creates a New Connection in Your Child's Brain

Every time your child hears a new sound for the first time, connections are made in their brain. Even simple sounds, like the distant sound of a vehicle, stimulate your baby's brain and result in new connections being made. When your child cannot hear, they are not working out the auditory cortex of their brain. Instead, the visual cortex of their brain is getting overworked, as that is their primary source of sensory input when their hearing is compromised.

Getting hearing aids will help your child create these vital brain connections.

#4: Hearing Aids Will Help Your Child

Getting hearing aids for your infant will help them out in many different ways. It will provide your child with the auditory stimulation that your child needs for its brain to grow. Being able to hear all the sounds around them will allow your child to develop both their receptive and expressive language skills and will allow your child to keep up with their developmental milestones.

Get your child in to see an audiologist's office or infant-care clinic as soon as possible so they can get equipped with hearing aids. This will allow your child to learn from their entire environment.

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