Onset — Progressive or Abrupt?

[GregCA]

In my case, I went to bed with silence, and woke up in the middle of the night to loud T, which had stayed pretty much the same since (even the pre vs post surgery wasn't that different). I wasn't stressed, or anything - totally normal day/night.

It would have been intuitive to me that, unless you had a trauma, it would maybe set in progressively, but somehow it came in one shot for me. Maybe my "special" otosclerosis did the equivalent of a trauma to my inner ear and broke something brutally. It is after all odd that otosclerosis would build up a 40 dB air-bone gap in 8 weeks only - it's supposed to take years/decades, but for me something happened very rapidly.

What about you? Progressive? In one shot?

 

[PaulBe]

Wasn't there, then it was. No obvious trigger in that instant.

How was your otosclerosis diagnosed? CT, MRI? Do you have low frequency hearing loss with it?

 

[GregCA]

How was your otosclerosis diagnosed? CT, MRI? Do you have low frequency hearing loss with it?

It was diagnosed from a variety of clues, but mostly audiograms showing low frequency hearing loss and air bone gap, CT scan, and tuning fork test.
I have losses everywhere because my otosclerosis seems to have attacked my cochlea, so I had a mix of conductive and sensorineural losses prior to my surgery. The surgery mostly "closed the air-bone gap", so I'm left with sensorineural losses, which are now heavier in the higher frequencies (slight slope).

 

[Vaba]

I had mild, "normal" T until I was 19 - then, I woke up with screeching hellish noise one day with no preceding trauma.

 

[undecided]

It was diagnosed from a variety of clues, but mostly audiograms showing low frequency hearing loss and air bone gap, CT scan, and tuning fork test.
I have losses everywhere because my otosclerosis seems to have attacked my cochlea, so I had a mix of conductive and sensorineural losses prior to my surgery. The surgery mostly "closed the air-bone gap", so I'm left with sensorineural losses, which are now heavier in the higher frequencies (slight slope).

Did you have previous tests (CT scans/audiograms etc) before getting worse? Maybe doing another round of them might reveal the cause of your recent problems.

 

[GregCA]

Did you have previous tests (CT scans/audiograms etc) before getting worse? Maybe doing another round of them might reveal the cause of your recent problems.

I have my CT scan from late march, which shows demineralization of the otic capsule, but no new CT since then (not sure how often I want my head to be hit with radiation). I'd love to have some kind of indication whether the fluoride treatment is working or not, but my doc tells me there's no way to "measure it", and that we need to wait 6 months of Fluoride to see if it's having an effect (and by that he's hoping that T is going to be lower - his rationale is that the bone remodeling process osteoblast/osteoclast is releasing enzymes that are irritating hair cells, potentially creating some of the T - so if that process stops and there aren't any more enzymes released, T would theoretically reduce).

The pre and post stapedotomy audiograms show that the air-bone gap has been closed relatively well, but the high frequencies have dropped slightly (possibly because of the surgery - it's a known possible side effect).
I take regular audiograms myself (every week) and it seems to be stable now, in the sense that there is no noticeable change in the past 2 months, but I know these things can evolve slowly (cochlear otosclerosis generally eats up about 2-3 dB per year, which isn't that much until you realize that you're deaf in a decade or two).

Did blood tests too: no change either.

 

[Mario martz]

Weird, i have my onset the same way.
one day i went to sleep in silence then i woke up with a noisy ear.

 

[PaulBe]

Mario were you much of a clubber? If you were your situation would be a lot like that of a musician where the exposures build and one day a tipping point is passed and the injury becomes evident. That's what is often postulated about sound-related injury. It seems to fit the case for me anyway. I probably didn't notice the trigger event, and the process once it had begun took time to evolve to the point of my awareness.

 

[Mario martz]

Mario were you much of a clubber? If you were your situation would be a lot like that of a musician where the exposures build and one day a tipping point is passed and the injury becomes evident. That's what is often postulated about sound-related injury. It seems to fit the case for me anyway. I probably didn't notice the trigger event, and the process once it had begun took time to evolve to the point of my awareness.

Hey PaulBe,
yes a big clubber here, actually one month before my onset i spent every weekend at a small noisy club, because it was my bday, so i decided to party big every weekend in jan (not a good idea) that month was also filled with lots of loud music, parties, clubs and fireworks D:

so i think the reason is obvious, its just that... the day before i got t... was very quiet and peaceful.
sooo i didnt make a connection at first.

 

[GregCA]

Mario were you much of a clubber? If you were your situation would be a lot like that of a musician where the exposures build and one day a tipping point is passed and the injury becomes evident. That's what is often postulated about sound-related injury. It seems to fit the case for me anyway. I probably didn't notice the trigger event, and the process once it had begun took time to evolve to the point of my awareness.

The audiologist I saw today told me that a tell for this kind of behavior is a notch/drop around 4 kHz in the audiogram of the patient.
What does your audiogram look like?

 

[PaulBe]

A 'mild" loss around 8 in the right, and "mild" loss through 4 to 8 in the Left where all the racket is.