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SUMMARY Objectives We have clarified the role of Universal Neonatal Hearing Screening (UNHS) for both early diagnosis and rapid treatment in order to improve the prognosis of the deaf child and reduce patient management costs. Although in Sicily UNHS has been progressively implemented, there is scarce data in the literature on this matter. Therefore, the main objective was to collect in the year 2018 the following data: number of newborns screened for hearing loss, number of infants “referred” to transiently evoked otoacoustic emissions (TEOAE), number of infants with pathologic auditory brainstem response (ABR) and number of infants affected by permanent hearing loss. Methods UNHS monitoring was conducted through the collection of data through a questionnaire, which was analysed evaluating the effectiveness and adherence to the screening program prepared by the Department for Health Activities and the Epidemiological Observatory (DASOE). Results In 2018, there were 40,243 newborns in Sicily. A total of 37,562 newborns were screened (93.3%). There were 1,328 “referred” infants with TEOAE (3.5%). On the 2 nd level, “referred” newborns examined were 1,080 of 1,328 expected (missing 248 “refer” newborns, equal to 18.6%). The number of “referred” infants confirmed with TEOAE was 113 of 1,080, while “referred” infants confirmed with ABR were 71. On the 3 rd level, 67 of 71 were infants examined: 28 infants were suffering from monolateral hearing loss (13 slight/mild, 13 moderate, 1 severe and 1 profound) and 39 from bilateral hearing loss (1slight/mild, 19 moderate, 13 severe and 7 profound). Excluding 7 infants from the NICU, 60 of 37,562 infants had hearing loss (1.5%). Conclusions The monitoring of the UNHS in Sicily has allowed obtaining the data of individual centres, absent in the literature to date, to verify the effectiveness of the screening, according to JCIH criteria, to highlight some criticalities and, finally, to propose possible solutions.

A prospective study was performed to investigate the changes in nasal cytology that occur in healthy premenopausal women throughout the menstrual cycle. Eighty-eight women with an ovulatory menstrual cycle underwent nasal sampling with a cytobrush by direct vision of the middle and inferior nasal turbinates during the follicular, periovular, and luteal phases of the menstrual cycle, and the specimens were evaluated with the maturation index. Hematoxylin-eosin staining showed the cytologic aspects of the nasal respiratory epithelium and of vaginal smears according to the three different phases of the menstrual cycle. Along with the vaginal cells, the nasal respiratory epithelium is an ovarian steroid target.