Audiological Evaluation

Annabelle had her hearing evaluation today. For obvious reasons, the hearing evaluation was required before any speech evaluation. I had actually received the prescription from Dr. Calk at Annabelle's 3 year wellness visit in January, but I waited to schedule anything because I didn't think I could manage anything else into my schedule during the first few months of this year.

Annabelle's speech has improved greatly since then, so right now, I don't feel that it was a mistake. I now believe that others can probably understand 90% of what Annabelle says. Both Dr. Calk and Dr. Colton have told me that other people should understand 90% of what she says at this age, so hopefully, she is now on target with her speech.

I would never wish that another one of my children will struggle with speech as Annabelle has, but I will say that this has definitely been an interesting learning experience. I really enjoyed watching Annabelle as Miss Laura tested her hearing this morning. It was a learning experience for me, and it is always fun to watch other people work to learn new things.

Miss Laura first used an ear scope in both ears. The ear scope sent a message to her computer which drew a little "mountain" as she called it. She used the ear scope to test for the following:

1. Fluid in the ears

2. Reflex to the muscle

Then, Miss Laura sent Annabelle into a sound proof room to play with a board of colored pegs. She placed tubes into Annabelle's ears. She asked Annabelle if she wanted Mommy in the room with her or outside with Miss Laura. "Out there with you," she responded with absolutely no hesitation. I couldn't believe it! She was comfortable with Miss Laura as soon as she met her. So, she apparently trusted that Miss Laura wouldn't close her in that room forever because if I were three years old, that room would have looked pretty scary to me!

She had a blast with the peg game! Miss Laura told her to place one of the colored pegs on the board whenever she heard a sound. Per Annabelle (later in the day), she was hearing beeps and baby, Mommy and Daddy birds chirping. Miss Laura mentioned beeps and birds, so she obviously didn't make that one up.

It was hilarious to watch her. Miss Laura told me, "you've got a talkative one here mama." Oh yes! We definitely have a talkative one! She never shuts up! Miss Laura seemed quite impressed with how well Annabelle followed instructions. She said that most kids just stare at her, so it seemed that Annabelle brought a lot of laughter into her day.

Here are just a few of the conversations between Annabelle and Miss Laura.

Miss Laura: What is your favorite color?

Annabelle: I like orange! Aaannnd, I like yellowwww, and boo, and red.

Miss Laura: What color do you want to use next?

Annabelle: I think I want to use red. I have two reds left.

Annabelle: I hear Sophia crying!

Miss Laura: Uh huh, now listen. Listen for the baby birds. Focus, Annabelle, focus.

I cannot tell you how many times Miss Laura would tell her to listen since Annabelle was talking her ear off. Miss Laura was always very polite when she told her to listen though.

Annabelle's expressions were hilarious too! It was funny to watch her facial and body expressions whenever she heard a beep or a bird chirping. "Mmmm?!?!," she would say as she jumped to place another peg on the board.

Miss Laura and Annabelle also played a game of "copy cat." Miss Laura would say a word and Annabelle was to repeat her when she heard her. I wonder if Miss Laura uses the same word at the same decibel every time for her evaluations because whenever Miss Laura said "birthday," Annabelle never responded. I asked her why Annabelle could never hear her say "birthday," and she said it was because it was at a very, very low decibel.

Here is another conversation between Annabelle and Miss Laura during the copy cat game.

Miss Laura: Cupcake.

Annabelle: Cupcake! Dat is Strawberry Shortcake's puppy dog.

I think "pupcake" is actually Strawberry Shortcake's puppy dog, so maybe the conversation went a little differently or maybe Annabelle thought Miss Laura said "pupcake."

For the last test, we went into another room, and Miss Laura hooked Annabelle's ears up to another machine. Annabelle just had to sit there for that test. Annabelle would hear beeps, and this machine tested her inner ear for echos. The echos were automatically logged on the screen by the machine. This inner ear testing is related to the hair cells in her inner ear.

It looks like she's hearing a beep in this next picture or just listening intently waiting for another one.

All pretty interesting stuff if you ask me. I just wish I knew more about how our ears work, but it was still definitely a learning experience. The audiological evaluation took approximately 30-45 minutes. They had allotted an hour for the testing.