Most babies will have their hearing screening done while they're in hospital, and it's best to have it done before they're one month old.
If the screening wasn’t done before you went home, or it needs to be done again, contact your maternity hospital to arrange one.
If you had a home birth, ask your midwife to refer you to a screening service.
If your baby wasn’t born in Queensland, but you moved shortly after the birth, you can contact your local maternity hospital to arrange a screen. Hospitals that offer Newborn Hearing screens are listed on the page below.
The Healthy Hearing head office team can help you contact your local maternity hospital screening team, but they don’t do screening or arrange appointments.
- Phone: 07 3310 6222
- Email: Healthy_Hearing@health.qld.gov.au
Please call Monday to Friday between 8 am and 3:30 pm.
The hearing screen is free if your baby is eligible for Medicare. If they're not, and you’ve paid for delivery and postnatal care, the hearing screen should be included. You may need to check this with your maternity hospital.
Outpatient screening
If your baby doesn’t get screened at birth, your maternity hospital will offer you an outpatient appointment within a couple of weeks. They'll contact you by either letter, phone or text message.
If you haven't heard anything in that time, contact your maternity hospital to arrange one.
What happens at the screening?
A specialist nurse or midwife will do the screening. They will talk to you about the screening to make sure you understand what will happen and get your consent.
Your baby will have to be asleep for the screen. Don’t worry if your baby’s awake when you arrive for an appointment as screeners have lots of experience helping babies settle.
The screener will put 3 small gel pads on your baby's head and a soft earmuff over each ear. They’ll play soft clicking sounds into your baby’s ears and record the response. You will usually know the result straight away – it will be a Pass or Refer for each ear.
The screener will record the result in your baby’s Red Book (Personal Health Record).
A Pass result
A pass result means that your baby has adequate hearing at the time of screening for normal speech and language development. Hearing can change, so it’s important to monitor your baby's hearing.The brochure the screener gave you at the time of screening also has a hearing and speech milestone checklist.
Talk to your GP if you’re worried about your baby’s hearing or speech development. Your GP can check your baby and refer them to an Audiologist for a hearing test if necessary.
A Refer result
A Refer result on the first screen means your baby needs a follow up screen. There are a few reasons why a baby receives a refer result and can include a fluid in the ear, a blockage in the ear canal or hearing loss.
If the second screen shows a Refer result, we’ll refer your baby to an audiologist for more tests.
A small number of babies have temporary or permanent hearing loss. The level and type of hearing loss will vary with each baby.
If your baby is diagnosed with a hearing loss, the Healthy Hearing Program provides extra services to help you and your baby. These include medical investigations, support services and early intervention.
Hearing loss that can take longer to appear
If your baby has a risk factor they will be referred to your nearest public hospital’s paediatric audiology service for follow up. The audiology department will offer your baby a follow up hearing check. The type of check depends on your child’s risk factor.
Find your nearest maternity hospital
Information and Resources
Information in other languages
We also have information in other languages.
Your baby's hearing screen
العربية | Arabic မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ | Burmese 简体中文 | Chinese (Simplified) 傳統的 | Chinese (Traditional) دری | Dari Thuɔŋjäŋ | Dinka Pilipino | Filipino Ελληνικά | Greek हिंदी | Hindi 日本語 | Japanese ကညီကျိၥ် | Karen ខ្មែរ | Khmer Ikirundi | Kirundi 한국어 | Korean فارس | Persian (Farsi) ਪੰਜਾਬੀ | Punjabi Samoa | Samoan Soomaali | Somali Español | Spanish Kiswahili | Swahili ไทย | Thai ردو| Urdu Tiếng Việt | Vietnamese
Your baby's audiology hearing test
العربية | Arabic မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ | Burmese 简体中文 | Chinese (Simplified) 傳統的 | Chinese (Traditional) دری | Dari Thuɔŋjäŋ | Dinka Pilipino | Filipino Ελληνικά | Greek हिंदी | Hindi 日本語 | Japanese ကညီကျိၥ် | Karen ខ្មែរ | Khmer Ikirundi | Kirundi 한국어 | Korean فارس | Persian (Farsi) ਪੰਜਾਬੀ | Punjabi Samoa | Samoan Soomaali | Somali Español | Spanish Kiswahili | Swahili ไทย | Thai ردو| Urdu Tiếng Việt | Vietnamese
Your baby's follow up hearing check
العربية | Arabic မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ | Burmese 简体中文 | Chinese (Simplified) 傳統的 | Chinese (Traditional) دری | Dari Thuɔŋjäŋ | Dinka Pilipino | Filipino Ελληνικά | Greek हिंदी | Hindi 日本語 | Japanese ကညီကျိၥ် | Karen ខ្មែរ | Khmer Ikirundi | Kirundi 한국어 | Korean فارس | Persian (Farsi)ਪੰਜਾਬੀ | Punjabi Samoa | Samoan Soomaali | Somali Español | Spanish Kiswahili | Swahili ไทย | Thai ردو| Urdu Tiếng Việt | Vietnamese
Healthy Hearing consent form
العربية | Arabic မြန်မာနိုင်ငံ | Burmese 简体中文 | Chinese (Simplified) 傳統的 | Chinese (Traditional) دری | Dari Thuɔŋjäŋ | Dinka Pilipino | Filipino Ελληνικά | Greek हिंदी | Hindi 日本語 | Japanese ကညီကျိၥ် | Karen ខ្មែរ | Khmer Ikirundi | Kirundi 한국어 | Korean فارس | Persian (Farsi)ਪੰਜਾਬੀ | Punjabi Samoa | Samoan Soomaali | Somali Español | Spanish Kiswahili | Swahili ไทย | Thai ردو| Urdu Tiếng Việt | Vietnamese