neonatal hearing screening and prevalence of hearing impairment in the time period of covid-19 epidemic in the north of iran

Background and aim: covid-19 is an acute respiratory disease, caused by a coronavirus named sars-cov-2. previous reports suggest an association between covid-19 infection and hearing loss (hl). we have investigated the universal newborn hearing screening (unhs) results in the time period of covid-19 epidemic in guilan province, north of iran. methods: we analyzed unhs results from10 major obstetrics hospitals from 20th mar 2020 to 19th mar 2021, and compared the total unhs positive/“refer” and total neonatal hl reports with the same time periods of recent three years. the prevalence of risk factors for hl were analyzed during the same period. results: the total number of childbirth was decreased significantly from 27735 birth cases in mar 2017-2018 to 18216 births in mar 2020-2021 (p<0.001), but the total “refer” rate was significantly increased from 63.0 per 1,000 births in mar 2019-2020 to 79.8 in mar 2020-2021 (or=1.29, 95% ci: 1.19-1.39, p<0.001), and also increased from 74.7 per 1,000 births in mar 2017-2020 to 79.8 in mar 2020-2021 (or=1.07, 95% ci: 1.01-1.14, p=0.020). the hl rate increased from 10.3 per 10,000 births in mar 2019-2020 and from 11.4 per 10,000 births in mar 2017-2020 to 18.7 in mar 2020-2021 (or=1.81 and 1.63, 95% ci: 1.06-3.09 and 1.10-2.44, p=0.028 and 0.015, respectively). the prevalence of preterm birth (p=0.039) and neonatal intensive care unit stay (p=0.016) was increased significantly during mar 2020-2021. conclusion: the chance of “refer” results and neonatal hl, found in the unhs program, increased during the covid-19 epidemic in comparison to the past years.