Deafness in adults

Deafness in adults, unlike blindness, is not precisely defined as a disability, so any degree of hearing loss can be described as deafness.

This is a defect to the patients themselves and to the persons in contact with them, since this reduces the possibility of communication. In the UK, there are approximately 3 million adults with hearing impairment.

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Conductive deafness in adults

It is associated with a violation of the conductivity of sound waves through the external auditory meatus and the middle ear to the base of the stirrup. Obstruction of the external auditory canal (sulfur plug, excretion due to external otitis, the presence of foreign bodies in the ear canal, malformations); perforation of the tympanic membrane (trauma, barotrauma, infection); disruption of communication between auditory ossicles (otosclerosis, infection, trauma) and inadequate ventilation of the middle ear through Eustachian tubes due to the presence of effusion (eg, secondary, associated with nasopharyngeal carcinoma) - all this can cause conductive deafness.

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Sensory-neural deafness in adults

Sensorine (sensorineural) hearing loss is caused by defects in the central link - the oval window in the cochlea (sensory disturbances), the snail's nerve (neural disorders) and rarely the defeat of the more central neural pathways. Ototoxic drugs (for example, streptomycin and generally aminoglycosides, especially gentamicin), like most of the causes of deafness occurring in early childhood, cause sensory-neural deafness. Hearing impairments caused by infections (measles, mumps, influenza, herpes infection, syphilis), cochlear-vascular pathology, Meniere's disease and presbyacious (senile deafness), are also sensory-neural. Rare causes deafness are neuroma auditory nerve, deficiency of vitamin B ₁₂, multiple sclerosis, brain tumor.

Otosclerosis in adults

Women are sick 2 times more often than men. The process is usually two-sided. In 50% of patients, heredity is burdened with this disease. Symptoms of otosclerosis appear even at a young age, during pregnancy the course of the disease is aggravated.

Pathology: while the vascularized spongy bone replaces the normal bone around the oval window (the cochlea), to which the base of the stapes is directly attached. Developing deafness develops (the patient hears better against a background of general noise), sometimes there are also noise in the ears (in the ear) and dizziness. Stapedectomy with replacement of the stapes with an implant is effective in 90% of patients.

Presbyacusis (senile deafness), or senile hearing loss

The loss of visual acuity and high-frequency sounds begins already at the age of 30 and subsequently progresses. So, old age deafness, or hearing loss, develops very slowly and is usually unnoticeable for patients, until the audibility of lower-frequency sounds of human speech is disturbed. Especially the rumor is violated on a background noise. No other treatment, in addition to auxiliary hearing aids, no.

Treatment of deafness in adults

First of all, it is necessary to determine the classification type of deafness, to determine if it is possible to eliminate it, and also to eliminate such dangerous causes of deafness as cholesteatoma, the presence of effusion associated with nasopharyngeal carcinoma. The sudden onset of sensory-neural deafness is an urgent condition and requires an urgent examination of the patient. It is necessary to understand which way it is best to deal with deafness in this case (for example, perform an operation with a perforation of the tympanic membrane, otosclerosis or simply take the most effective measures to improve the hearing). If it is a matter of deep sensory-neural disorders, then it may be a question of a cochlear implant.