Booth Testing

Lucas had his first behavioural testing in the sound booth done last week. I very interested to see how it would go. Cindy (his audiologist) explained it to me, and it kind of sounded like a lot to expect from a little baby, but I trust her expertise.

I went in the booth with Lucas, and another Audiologist (Nancy, I think) came in with us. Her job was to play with Lucas, watch for reactions, and point out the little bear that would light up and play drums in the corner after a sound was presented. The goal was for him to correlate to sound to the bear moving. They put little microphones in each ear to send sound into, and Cindy sat outside the booth both talking into the microphones and sending tones into them. I thought we were going to test him with his hearing aids on, but for this test we just tested his natural hearing.

The first few times he heard a sound the audiologist pointed out the bear and made a big deal about it. The third or fourth time he heard a sound he whipped his little head right around to look at the bear before it even lit up. I got a little teary at that first reaction. Deafness sometimes has other syndromes and disabilities associated with it, including cognitive delays, so to see him catch on SO quickly made me feel so good. Of course it also meant he heard the sound she was sending in!

We were in the booth for at least half an hour. He did SO well. He was happy and playing, and responding the whole time. Towards the very end he started losing interest and getting hungry, but still no fussing. We decided to end it there. Cindy was really pleased with how well he did. She said they way he reacted to the sound was great- it meant he's understanding that sound has meaning, and also is learning how to localize to where it's coming from (she tested the right ear too, and he turned in the correct direction!). He also tested right about where his ABR said he should be testing! It was yet another learning experience for me! From now on we'll be having those periodically.

After the booth test we took impressions for new molds since his current ones are starting to get a lot of feedback. I got him red and green swirled molds for the holidays! I couldn't resist!! :D He gets them next week!