Prevalence of hearing loss, tinnitus, vertigo and sudden deafness among patients with polymyositis and dermatomyositis

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 14; no. 1; p. 5774
• Main Authors: Hung, Shih-Han, Xirasagar, Sudha, Dang, Luong Huu, Viet-Nhi, Nguyen-Kieu, Cheng, Yen-Fu, Chen, Chin-Shyan, Lin, Herng-Ching
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 09.03.2024; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 631/250; 692/4023; 692/617; Deafness; Dermatomyositis; Epidemiology; Hearing loss; Humanities and Social Sciences; Inner ear; Inner ear disorders; multidisciplinary; Polymyositis; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Statistical analysis; Tinnitus; Vertigo; Inner ear disorders; Polymyositis; Tinnitus; Epidemiology; Dermatomyositis
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-56372-z

Little is known about a possible association of autoimmune inner ear disease among patients diagnosed with polymyositis (PM)/dermatomyositis (DM). This study aimed to explore differences in the prevalence of inner ear symptoms among patients with and without PM/DM using a nationwide population-based dataset. Data for this study were retrieved from the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database. The study sample included 1622 patients diagnosed with PM/DM and 8109 propensity-score matched comparison patients without PM/DM. We performed multivariate logistic regressions to calculate odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence interval (CI) for tinnitus, hearing loss, sudden deafness, and vertigo among patients with PM/DM versus comparison patients. Chi-square tests showed statistically significant differences between patients with PM/DM and comparison patients in the prevalence of tinnitus (16.1% vs. 12.7%, p  < 0.001), non-conductive hearing loss (9.2% vs. 6.8%, p  < 0.001), and vertigo (14.4% vs. 11.1%, p  < 0.001). The adjusted ORs for tinnitus, non-conductive hearing loss, and vertigo, respectively, were 1.332 (95% CI = 1.147–1.547), 1.399 (95% CI = 1.154–1.696), and 1.374 (95% CI = 1.173–1.611) for patients with PM/DM when compared to comparison patients. Our study finds that patients with PM/DM have higher prevalence rates of tinnitus, non-conductive hearing loss, and vertigo than comparison patients.