The search for answers

August was born in Denmark, his daddy's native country. With me being American and not understanding enough of the Danish language, it was extremely difficult to understand what the doctors were telling us most of the time. My husband would translate as much as possible but with all the medical terms that were used it was not so easy to translate.
We were set up with a Danish ENT doctor whom explained as best he could in English. We did learn however, that the deformity was called Atresia Microtia. Atresia means, malformation of the external ear and most of the time the middle ear as well. Microtia, is Latin for small ear.
But again we were told that there was nothing we could do at this time. He was too little to have a hearing test to that ear and it was a bad idea to do anything until he was at least eighteen years old. He was to have a normal life growing up with just one ear. I should not be worried a bit.
I was still not pleased with that answer. I was determined, as his mother, to know as much information as I could about what we were dealing with. He was not going to be lost in the system and not get every opportunity he deserved.
So I continued my research on websites. I spoke to ENT's in the US and finally got in touch with a cranial facial team at UCLA.
On our visit to America, when August was just three months,UCLA was gracious enough to squeeze us in with short notice. August was be evaluated by the entire facial team. The panel of doctors explained in detail surgery options and hearing tests.
We met with oral surgeons, cosmetic surgeons, atresia repair surgeons, etc. We were told August could be a candidate for repairing the outer ear at the age of eight. He could also have atresia repair but he would have to wait to find out until he was about two and a half. He could undergo a CT scan that would determine the likelihood of him being able to hear or not, if the bones and facial nerve would or would not interfere with a canal surgery and if the middle bones were intact.
Since we were on a short visit of only four weeks to America, we had no time to run a hearing test in the microtia ear. So we would have to wait until our return to America on a later date. A hearing test would help us understand the depth of hearing August already had even without the canal.