Association between Otosclerosis and Rubella in Taiwan: A Nationwide Case-Control Study

• Published in: Journal of clinical medicine Vol. 12; no. 5; p. 1761
• Main Authors: Hwang, Juen-Haur, Yu, Ben-Hui, Chen, Yi-Chun
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 22.02.2023; MDPI
• Subjects: Age; case-control study; Clinical medicine; Complications and side effects; Disease; Estrogens; Family medical history; Hearing loss; Infections; Measles; Metabolism; Mumps; Otosclerosis; Pathogenesis; Population; Risk factors; Rubella; Statistics; T cell receptors; Vertigo; Viral infections; virus; Viruses; Taiwan; United States > US; otosclerosis; rubella; case-control study; virus
• ISSN: 2077-0383; 2077-0383
• DOI: 10.3390/jcm12051761

Otosclerosis is an early adult-onset disease that is associated with 5-9% and 18-22% of all cases of hearing and conductive hearing loss, respectively, and it is suspected to have a viral etiology. However, the role of viral infection in otosclerosis is still inconclusive. This study aimed to investigate whether rubella infection was associated with otosclerosis risk. We conducted a nationwide case-control study in Taiwan. Data were retrospectively analyzed from the Taiwan National health Insurance Research Database. Cases consisted of all patients who were aged ≥6 years and had a first-time diagnosis of otosclerosis for the period between 2001 and 2012. The controls were exact matched to cases in a 4:1 ratio by birth year, sex, and must survive in the index year of their matched cases. Adjusted odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) were estimated by using conditional logistic regression. We examined 647 otosclerosis cases and 2588 controls without otosclerosis. Among the 647 patients with otosclerosis, 241 (37.2%) were male and 406 (62.8%) were female, with most aged between 40 and 59 years, with a mean age of 44.9 years. After adjusting for age and sex, conditional logistic regression revealed that exposure to rubella was not associated with a significant increase in otosclerosis risk (adjusted OR, 2.0; 95% CI, 0.18-22.06, = 0.57). In conclusion, this study did not show that rubella infection was associated with the risk of otosclerosis in Taiwan.