Hearing Loss Related with Type 2 Diabetes in an Elderly Population

RESULTS: The current investigation produced five major findings. The diabetics had higher thresholds for all frequencies, except 0.25 kHz, compared to the controls. Although there were significant differences at low frequencies, such as 0.5 and 1 kHz, the differences were most pronounced at 2, 4, and 8 kHz. The thresholds for speech reception were significantly higher in the diabetics than in the controls. Also, there were no side differences between the right and left ears in the diabetics or the controls, and the diabetics had lower speech discrimination scores than the controls. CONCLUSION: Diabetes is a complex, systemic disease that can affect multiple organs and physiological functions, on molecular and biochemical levels. The current investigation showed that elderly DM2 subjects had poorer hearing levels when compared with age and sex matched non-DM2 subjects.