A recently published review in the Archives of Otolaryngology, Head & Neck Surgery has suggested that treating sudden hearing loss with steroids may not be effective as thought previously by members of the medical fraternity.

Sudden Hearing Loss or sudden sensorineural hearing loss is known to known to affect five-to-twenty of every 100,000 people in the world and is difficult to be cured despite the availability of treatment forms such as vitamins, herbs, minerals, antiviral medications, hyperbaric oxygen, and agents capable of diluting the blood.

From News-Medical.Net:

Anne Elizabeth Conlin, B.A. & Sc., M.D., of the University of Ottawa, Ontario, and Lorne S. Parnes, M.D., F.R.C.S.C., of the University of Western Ontario, London, Canada, searched for all randomized clinical trials evaluating treatments for sudden hearing loss published between 1966 and 2006.

For the systematic review, 21 trials were identified and evaluated, all of which used measures from hearing tests to define treatment outcomes. “Only two studies used identical criteria to define sudden sensorineural hearing loss,” the authors write. “The method of randomization was described in two studies. Validity scores ranged from two to eight (of nine). Positive results were reported favoring systemic steroids, intratympanic [inside the inner ear] steroids, batroxobin, magnesium, vitamin E and hyperbaric oxygen, although there were serious limitations in each study with a positive finding.”

It was remarked by the authors that the cause of sudden hearing loss is often unknown or unexplained; its treatment can be difficult when compared to that of other body ailments.