Bimodal strategy for excellent audiological rehabilitation in a subject with a novel nonsense mutation of the SLC26A4 gene: A case report

n/

Tinnitus and Neuropsychological Dysfunction in the Elderly: A Systematic Review on Possible Links

Introduction: Tinnitus is a common and disabling symptom often associated with hearing loss. While clinical practice frequently shows that a certain degree of psychological discomfort often characterizes tinnitus suffers, it has been recently suggested in adults as a determining factor for cognitive decline affecting attention and memory domains. The aim of our systematic review was to provide evidence for a link between tinnitus, psychological distress, and cognitive dysfunction in older patients and to focus on putative mechanisms of this relationship. Methods: We performed a systematic review, finally including 192 articles that were screened. This resulted in 12 manuscripts of which the full texts were included in a qualitative analysis. Results: The association between tinnitus and psychological distress, mainly depression, has been demonstrated in older patients, although only few studies addressed the aged population. Limited studies on cognitive dysfunction in aged patients affected by chronic tinnitus are hardly comparable, as they use different methods to validate cognitive impairment. Actual evidence does not allow us with certainty to establish if tinnitus matters as an independent risk factor for cognitive impairment or evolution to dementia. Conclusion: Tinnitus, which is usually associated with age-related hearing loss, might negatively affect emotional wellbeing and cognitive capacities in older people, but further studies are required to improve the evidence

Audio-Vestibular Alterations During the Phases of the Menstrual Cycle in Patients with Cochlear Implant

Background: The female hormones fluctuations in woman’s life play a dominant role in homeostasis of the body and can influence the psycho-neurological processes in different body systems. In particular, in the auditory system seems that hormonal alterations during the menstrual cycle can compromise the homeostasis of the labyrinthine fluids altering balance and/or hearing. Aims/Objectives: Our study aims to verify if hormonal changes during different menstrual phases may have an influence, in females with cochlear implants, on the trend of auditory and vestibular performances. Materials and methods: Tonal, speech audiometry, vestibular examination and a measure of cochlear implants electrodes impedances were realized in the follicular and luteal phases on a group of eight women who are at a fertile age, affected by profound sensorineural form of hearing loss and carrying a monolateral cochlear implant. Results: Audio-vestibular alterations, as well as, an increase of impedance electrodes are reported in the luteal phase. Conclusions: Our work suggests that audio-vestibular alterations are related to the different phases of the menstrual cycle with consequent variation also of the performances of the implant. It is very important to keep in mind this aspect to avoid negative results during rehabilitation

Phenotypic and genetic characterization of a family carrying two Xq21.1-21.3 interstitial deletions associated with syndromic hearing loss

Sensorineural hearing impairment is a common pathological manifestation in patients affected by X-linked intellectual disability. A few cases of interstitial deletions at Xq21 with several different phenotypic characteristics have been described, but to date, a complete molecular characterization of the deletions harboring disease-causing genes is still missing. Thus, the aim of this study is to realize a detailed clinical and molecular analysis of a family affected by syndromic X-linked hearing loss with intellectual disability

The development of language in babies and the role of the family

Nowadays for deaf children there are many new opportunities that provide enhanced ways of hearing stimulation.These concerns may result as much more significant as the family is engaged in the stimulation program. An NHS program in Campania was launched in 2005. According to these concerns, the family plays a central role both in the diagnostic and the therapeutic intervention of the impaired children. As paradigm of the important role of the family in the rehab project is a comparison between two kids in charge by our team. The outcomes are better in children who received stimulation by the family

Current research trends in clinical audiology

Sensorineural hearing loss is a very diffuse pathology in population and regenerative medicine is the most promising treatment for restoring hearing function by repairing missing or harmful gene products. There are several sectors characterized by different therapeutic solutions and methodologies such as gene therapy, genomic editing, stem cell transplantation, cell reprogramming and tissue engineering. This study summarized a literature review, by an electronic database search including PubMed and a manual search of relevant journals, for the relevant strategies utilized for restoring hearing loss, both for recessive or dominant forms, with a focus on different types of vectors that target the cochlea and approaches to overcome the anatomical barriers inherent to inner ear delivery. Based on what is reported in this review, it seems plausible to state that innovative therapeutic strategies such as gene therapy and genome editing will be used in the near future for precise DNA editing for each patient and for any disease

Targeted Audiological Surveillance Program in Campania, Italy

To identify children with postnatal hearing loss, a structured monitoring system is needed. The goal of this study was to describe a targeted surveillance program in Italy to identify children with postnatal hearing loss

Newborn hearing screening in the Campania region (Italy): early language and perceptual outcomes of infants with permanent hearing los

Hearing loss in children causes a deficit in early perceptive and language skills. The objective of this study was to evaluate early receptive and expressive language outcomes in children with hearing loss, identified by hearing screening, compared to the time of diagnosis. We studied 18 severely hearing impaired children who were divided into two groups according to the time of diagnosis. Evaluation of communicative language ability was carried out at 18 month of age using the "MacArthur Child Development Inventory" questionnaire, while evaluation of acoustic-perceptual abilities was assessed with the Genovese-Arslan protocol every three months following diagnosis. The linguistic communicative and acoustic-perceptual outcomes of hearing impaired children diagnosed before 6 months of age followed those expected for normally hearing children, with a trend of temporal progression of skills that were faster than those of children diagnosed after 6 months of age