Older People Lose Hearing Because of Low Vitamin B Levels

Age-related hearing loss – ARHL, is part of the top four most common chronic conditions in the elderly, and according to a new research, it is linked to low serum levels of folic acid.

Everybody knows older people with hearing impairment, but even this is a very frequent problem, scientists have no idea of the biological basis of age-related hearing loss.

So maybe this new study is a major breakthrough, because the researchers found a connection between low serum levels of folic acid among elderly people and hearing loss in high frequencies.

The study consisted in face-to-face interviews with 126 Nigerian men and women, over 60 years old, who had been seen by physicians and had no known medical conditions.

People with a history of diabetes, hypertension, stroke, ear infections, ear diseases, ear trauma, ear surgery, or exposure to noise and ototoxic drugs like aminoglycosides, antibiotics, and diuretics, were excluded from the study.

Study author Akeem Olawale Lasisi, MBChB, FWACS, FMCORL said that “based on our research, age-related hearing loss may be associated with poor micronutrient status.

“The role of folate in cellular metabolism, the nervous system, and vascular function are important for the auditory system.”

The main discovery of the three researchers was the link between low serum levels of folic acid and high-frequency hearing loss in the elderly.

As relatively low levels of vitamins are nothing unusual in medically under-served populations like that in the study, the authors said that continuing to assess the role of vitamins in auditory function is necessary, especially in developing countries with widespread malnutrition problems.

Hearing loss affects older people around the world, and in the United States, there are over 28 million individuals between the ages of 60 and 74, dealing with it every day.

Folic acid is a water-soluble vitamin of the vitamin B complex, which is necessary for the formation of red blood cells and has a very important role in embryonic development, and can be found mostly in green leafy vegetables, liver, and fresh fruit.

This new study is published in the December 2010 issue of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery.