A study written up in the February 1 issue of Otolaryngology — Head and Neck Surgery reports that children with cochlear implants rate their quality of life as highly as children with normal hearing. It is one of the first studies that looked at children as well as their parents.
A gene associated with a rare form of progressive deafness in males has been identified by an international team of researchers funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders. The gene, PRPS1, appears to be crucial in inner ear development and maintenance. The findings are published in the December 17 early online [...]
A recent article in USA Today reported on a helpful new resource for people who are considering the purchase of a hearing aid—or whose loved ones are. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has just published a primer on Hearing Aids that includes such useful topics as types of hearing aids, benefits and safety issues, and how to [...]
Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley and a consortium of Korean institutions finds that there is "possible evidence linking mobile phone use to an increased risk of tumors." Their analysis has been published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.During the meta-analysis, researchers examined 465 articles published in major journals and focused on 23 studies involving [...]
Consumer Reports recently conducted an exhaustive study on the process of purchasing hearing aids, and concluded that people are better off buying their hearing aids from a medical office headed by an otolaryngologist (an ear, nose, and throat physician) who employs an audiologist to fit and dispense hearing aids. Consumer Reports followed a dozen actual patients for six [...]
Studies presented at the Association for Research in Otolaryngology's annual conference earlier this year suggests that it may be possible for a combination of vitamins to protect against noise-induced and even age-related hearing loss in humans. Two separate studies, one using guinea pigs and the other, mice---showed that vitamin supplements containing the antioxidants beta carotene, vitamins [...]
As if you needed another reason to quit smoking: researchers at my Alma Mater, Vanderbilt University, have concluded that smokers are more likely than nonsmokers to suffer complications and worse hearing following middle ear surgery. In a study of more than 1,100 people who underwent surgery to fix chronic ear problems during the period 1990 [...]
An interesting article about a project from Stanford University was recently released detailing how the sensory "hair" cells in the inner ear are able to convert the mechanical energy of sound to an electrical impulse that is relayed to the brain through the hearing nerve. This occurs at a molecular level in which charged particles [...]
An interesting blog was posted April 8 on the Newsweek website by health care reporter Sharon Begley. It reports on the results of a study on Neuromonics, a treatment for tinnitus, or ringing in the ears. The results were presented in April at the American Academy of Audiology.According to the study, 45 patients who were [...]
My patients with hearing loss often ask me if there are any new medical ear treatments on the horizon. One promising study is being conducted by researchers at the University of California, Davis and focuses on the possible use of stem cells from another part of the brain that can develop into cells that perform [...]