Long-term objective and subjective audiologic consequences of closed head injury

During a period of 5 years, a total of 47 patients, 16-60 years of age, with major closed head injury (CHI) were admitted to 2 Swedish medical centres. Seven to 11 years after injury, 25 of them (mean age 40.8 years; range 25-59 years) were evaluated using peripheral and central auditory tests, and most of them also completed 2 questionnaires concerning self-assessed hearing ability and quality of life. Twenty-two patients did not participate in the long-term follow-up tests: 15 were excluded for medical reasons and 4 did not wish to participate; an additional 2 were impossible to trace and 1 had died. As many as 68% of patients (17/25) demonstrated abnormalities on 1 or more of the audiometric tests, 14 on pure-tone audiometry (p < 0.02) and/or central audiometric tests (3 on central tests only and 2 on pure-tone audiometry only). Four out of six patients with available early post-traumatic audiograms showed a significant progressive deterioration. As a group, their assessments of hearing ability and quality of life were equal to or better than those of the controls. These results may indicate that a higher priority should be given to obtaining an early audiologic evaluation of every CHI patient than is the rule today. The impact of post-traumatic progress and central lesions on social hearing at an advanced age is highlighted.