Association of age-related hearing loss, tinnitus, and chronic low back pain in middle-aged and older Korean adults

by Hye-Mi Noh, Yi Hwa Choi, Jee Hye Wee, Hong Ji Song, Hye-Ji An, Keum Ji Kim, Soo Kyung Lee, Min Soo Jang, Nayoung Yeon This was a cross-sectional study conducted to evaluate the association between hearing impairment and low back pain (LBP) using data from the Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. A total of 5,504 middle-aged and older Korean adults (aged ≥50 years old) who underwent plain rad iography of the lumbar spine and pure tone audiometry were included. The presence of LBP was evaluated using a questionnaire, which included a question on whether the patient had experienced LBP that lasted for more than 30 days during the past three months. Patients with age-related hearing loss (A RHL) were defined as those with bilateral hearing impairment who met the following criteria: 1) normal otologic examination results, 2) average pure-tone hearing thresholds of ≤15 dB in both ears, and 3) no occupational noise exposure. Multivariable logistic regression analysis showed that ARHL wa s not associated with LBP (odds ratio, 1.33; 95% CI, 0.94–1.89) after adjusting for potential confounders in the final model. However, when participants without both ARHL and tinnitus were defined as the reference group, the results showed that the participants with both ARHL and tinnitus were mor e likely to have LBP (OR, 1.86; 95% CI, 1.11–3.11). These results indicate that ARHL with tinnitus is significantly associated with LBP. We recommend that elderly patients wi...
Source: PLoS One - Category: Biomedical Science Authors: Source Type: research