2020 Volume 123 Issue 1 Pages 40-47
We investigated the efficacy of combined high-dose steroid therapy and prostaglandin E1 (PGE1) treatment for idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSHL). This study was conducted in 324 patients who were hospitalized and treated for idiopathic SSHL with the aforementioned drug combination at the Yamagata City Hospital Saiseikan between January 2012 and December 2017. Data on the patient age, interval (days) from onset to treatment, pretreatment hearing level and posttreatment hearing level were collected from the medical records. Patients were classified as having achieved complete recovery if they had achieved a posttreatment hearing level of less than 20 dB in frequencies of 250, 500, 1000, 2000, and 40000 Hz, or a posttreatment hearing level on the affected side equal to that on the unaffected side. Patients were classified as having achieved good recovery if their posttreatment hearing level had improved by more than a mean of 30 dB in frequencies of 250, 500, 1000, 2000, and 40000 Hz. We defined the improvement rate by the number of patients who had achieved complete or good recovery.
We examined the complete recovery rate and improvement rate for the entire study population. The complete recovery rate was defined as the percentage of patients who had achieved complete recovery, and was 39.8%. The improvement rate was defined as the combined percentage of patients who had achieved complete recovery or good recovery, and was 52.2% for the total patient population. A multiple logistic regression analysis revealed significant correlations of the interval from the onset to treatment and the initial hearing level with the complete recovery rate, and also a significant correlation of age with the improvement rate.
The improvement rate in patients in whom the treatment was begun within 7 days of onset was significantly higher than that in patients in whom the treatment was started more than 8 days from the onset.
