Association Between Hepatitis B and Hearing Status

Abstract

Objective: Viral diseases are one of the common causes of hearing loss. The inner ear may be involved directly or by secondary reaction (e.g., polyarthritis nodosa). This study was performed to investigate the relation between positive HBS-Ag (hepatitis B disease) and hearing loss. Methods: This case-study research was done on 95 hepatitis-B patients as the case group and 97 normal cases as the control group. They were selected sequentially and audiologic tests were performed on the participants. The hearing thresholds of the two groups were compared using the t-test. Results: According to audiometry results, pure tone average (mean thresholds of 500, 1000 and 2000 Hz) were 22.1 dB for the left ear and 23.95 dB for the right ear in hepatitis-B group and 8.4 dB for the left ear and 8.95 dB for the right ear in the control group (HBS-Ag negative). The difference between two groups was statistically significant with p-value less than 0.05. Conclusion: The results show that hepatitis-B patients are more prone to hearing loss and that hepatitis B disease can cause hearing loss. This study suggests that hepatitis B prophylaxis is important in decreasing hepatitis-B involvement and therefore, hearing loss.

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