[tri-med] FYI - Selective Inner Hair Cell Loss in Premature Infants

I am forwarding this article or URL for your information (FYI) as I believe
it may be of interest and is from a reliable source. As always, check the
information with your own doctor or health care professional before starting
or changing any treatments.

Selective Inner Hair Cell Loss in Premature Infants and Cochlea Pathological
Patterns From Neonatal Intensive Care Unit Autopsies


  Monica G. Amatuzzi, MD; Clarinda Northrop; M. Charles Liberman, PhD; Aaron
Thornton, PhD; Christopher Halpin, PhD; Barbara Herrmann, PhD; Luis E.
Pinto, MD; Alberto Saenz, MD; Alfonso Carranza, MD; Roland D. Eavey, MD


Background  Deafness and handicapping sensorineural hearing impairment occur
frequently in neonatal intensive care unit survivors for unknown reasons.

Patients and Methods  Hearing was tested early and repeatedly in neonatal
intensive care unit patients with an auditory brainstem response (ABR)
screener. The temporal bones of 15 nonsurvivors (30 ears) were fixed
promptly (average, 5 hours) after death for histological evaluation.

Results  Among these patients, 12 failed the ABR screen bilaterally, 1
passed unilaterally, and 2 passed bilaterally. Cochlear histopathologic
conditions that could contribute to hearing loss included bilateral
selective outer hair cell loss in 2 patients, bilateral selective inner hair
cell loss in 3 (all premature), and a combination of both outer and inner
hair cell loss in 2. Other hair cell abnormalities were noted; the 2 infants
who had passed the ABR screen demonstrated normal histological features.
Neuronal counts were normal.

Conclusions  Auditory brainstem response failure among these neonatal
intensive care unit infants who died was extremely common in part owing to
an unexpected histological alteration, selective inner hair cell loss among
premature newborns, that should be detectable uniquely by the ABR testing
method. Additional histological patterns suggest more than one cause for
neonatal intensive care unit hearing loss. Hair cell loss patterns seem
frequently compatible with in utero damage.

Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2001;127:629-636

http://archotol.ama-assn.org/issues/current/abs/ooa00153.html

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