Sudden Deafness in the Elderly

Chon, Kyong Myong; Cho, Kyu Sup; Lee, Il Woo; Choi, Jin Sik; Wang, Soo Geun; Goh, Eui Kyung

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES
Sudden deafness in the elderly is rare and its prognosis is poorer than in adults. The unaffected ear also may have hearing impairment of variable severity and physiological hearing threshold shift termed presbycusis in the elderly. The old person often had various systemic complications including diabetes and hypertension. This study was designed to evaluate clinical manifestations and prognosis of sudden deafness in the elderly and to compare with sudden deafness in adults and children. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: We reviewed the medical and audiological records of 96 patients (102 ears) who are more than 60 years of age, and admitted to the Department of Otolaryngology, Pusan National University Hospital from January 1990 to December 2001. RESULTS: The total recovery rate of sudden deafness was lower in the elderly than in adults and children. Hearing recovery was significantly poorer in the patients with diabetes and hypertension. Hearing recovery was significantly poor in the patients with profound degree of hearing loss. The patients who had been treated within 7 days after onset of hearing loss showed better recovery rate than those treated 7 days later. CONCLUSION: We consider the effect of treatment of sudden deafness in the elderly to be best judged in various degrees of hearing impairment in the unaffected ear. The poor prognosis observed in patients with the concurrent disease is likely to have been brought about by preexisting microvascular diseases of the hearing organ, which is highly affected by aging. Good hearing recovery in the elderly is considered to be associated with time of initial treatment and expected in patients without concurrent diseases.