Opportunity analysis of newborn screening programs

Resum

There exist congenital diseases that reduce newborns' potential opportunities. This reduction is sometimes alleviated if the congenital disease is early detected thanks to a newborn screening program. We propose an outcome measurement of newborn screening programs based on the opportunity gains they offer after its implementation. We show that, under plausible assumptions, preferences among the available screening programs for a particular disease according to this new outcome measurement, do not depend on the metric of opportunity. We also apply our model to the current debate about choosing between a selective or a universal newborn hearing screening program to detect congenital hearing impairment.