PurposeHearing loss can lead to a number of disabilities and can reduce quality of life. Noise-induced hearing losses have become more common among adolescents due to increased exposure to personal music players. We, therefore, investigated the use of personal music player among Korean adolescents and the relationship between hearing threshold and usage pattern of portable music players.Materials and MethodsA total of 490 adolescents were interviewed personally regarding their use of portable music players, including the time and type of player and the type of headphone used. Pure tone audiometry was performed in each subject.ResultsOf the 490 subjects, 462 (94.3%) used personal music players and most of them have used the personal music player for 1-3 hours per day during 1-3 years. The most common type of portable music player was the MP3 player, and the most common type of headphone was the earphone (insert type). Significant elevations of hearing threshold were observed in males, in adolescents who had used portable music players for over 5 years, for those over 15 years in cumulative period and in those who had used earphones.ConclusionPortable music players can have a deleterious effect on hearing threshold in adolescents. To preserve hearing, adolescents should avoid using portable music players for long periods of time and should avoid using earphones.

Although cochlear damage is believed to trigger the perception of tinnitus in the central auditory system, its pathophysiological mechanism is still unclear. We aimed to investigate the pathophysiology of tinnitus using psychoacoustic assessments of auditory spectral and temporal resolution and speech perception in noise. Human subjects with tinnitus and symmetric hearing thresholds were divided into three groups: nine unilateral tinnitus subjects with normal hearing thresholds (Group 1), 12 unilateral tinnitus subjects with hearing loss (HL; Group 2), and nine bilateral tinnitus subjects with HL. Fifteen normal-hearing subjects without tinnitus were also tested as a control group. Four different tests were administered: (1) the spectral-ripple discrimination (SRD) test, (2) the temporal modulation detection (TMD) test, (3) the Schroeder-phase discrimination (SPD) test, and (4) the speech recognition threshold (SRT) in noise test. There were no significant differences in SRD, TMD, and SPD between the tinnitus-affected ears (TEs) and non-tinnitus ears (NTEs) in Groups 1 and 2 (p Ͼ 0.05). In contrast, the TEs showed poorer SRTs than the NTEs in these two subject groups (p ϭ 0.022 and 0.049). No inferiority of spectral/temporal resolution in TEs compared with NTEs suggests that there may be no more outer hair cell (OHC) damage on the tinnitus side given that damaged OHCs are associated with broadening the auditory filters. The decoupling of the SRT results from the spectral/ temporal resolution data could imply that the occurrence of tinnitus does not depend upon the degree of damage to the OHCs, but rather upon different plastic changes in the central auditory system after cochlear damage.

The mean age of the 11 patients with multiple cranial neuropathy (6 men, 5 women) was 49.2 ± 19.4 years, although 7 were aged 50 years or older. Eight patients had right-sided and three had left-sided facial paralysis. The initial degree of facial paralysis was House-Brackmann (HB) grade IV in four patients (36.4%) and HB grade V in seven (63.6%). Six patients showed improvement in symptoms, whereas five (45.6%) showed no improvement. The recovery rates from facial paralysis in patients with and without multiple cranial neuropathy were 54.5% and 82.9%, respectively, and the complete recovery rates were 27.3% and 67.7%, respectively.

The results of the present study indicate that ITD injection plus alprazolam medication is the best treatment choice for acute SIT within 3 months of development.

ObjectivesTo compare tinnitus patients who have normal hearing between 250 Hz and 8 kHz with normal controls with regard to the ability of each group to hear extended high-frequency pure tone thresholds.MethodsWe enrolled 18 tinnitus patients, each of whom had a threshold of HL <25 dB and threshold differences of <10 dB between ears at frequencies of 250 and 500 Hz and 1, 2, 4, and 8 kHz. We also enrolled age- and gender-matched normal volunteers (10 ears), for each patient. Extended high frequency pure tone audiometry was performed, and the mean hearing thresholds at 10, 12, 14, and 16 kHz of each tinnitus ear were compared with those of the 10 age- and sex-matched normal ears.ResultsOf the 18 patients with tinnitus, 12 had significantly increased hearing thresholds at more than one of the four high frequencies, compared with the normal group. When we assessed results according to frequency, we found that 8 patients had decreased hearing ability at 10 kHz, 10 at 12 kHz, 8 at 14 kHz, and 4 at 16 kHz.ConclusionSome patients with tinnitus who have normal hearing below 8 kHz have decreased hearing ability at extended high-frequencies. Thus, the proportion of patients with tinnitus who have normal hearing over the entire audible range is smaller than in previous reports.