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Hearing Status in Pediatric Renal Transplant Recipients
Kaan Gulleroglu1, Esra Baskin, Erdinc Aydin
1Pediatric Nephrology Department, Baskent University, Ankara, Turkey.
Insights
Pediatric renal transplant recipients have a high prevalence of sensorineural hearing impairment. High cyclosporine levels, a common immunosuppressant, may cause this hearing loss in a dose-dependent manner.
Area of Science:
- Nephrology
- Audiology
- Pediatric Medicine
Background:
- Renal transplantation offers long-term survival for children.
- Hearing impairment significantly impacts quality of life.
- Hearing status in pediatric renal transplant recipients is understudied.
Purpose of the Study:
- To assess hearing status in pediatric renal transplant patients.
- To identify factors contributing to hearing impairment post-transplant.
Main Methods:
- Audiologic assessment using pure-tone audiometry in 27 pediatric renal transplant recipients.
- Analysis of factors potentially causing hearing impairment.
Main Results:
- Sensorineural hearing impairment detected in 17 patients, particularly at higher frequencies (4000-8000 Hz).
- 8 patients experienced decreased speech understanding.
- Significantly higher cyclosporine levels were observed in patients with hearing impairment and decreased speech understanding compared to those without.
Conclusions:
- High prevalence of sensorineural hearing impairment in pediatric renal transplant recipients.
- Cyclosporine toxicity is a potential cause of hearing impairment, possibly dose-dependent.
- Further research is warranted to confirm the link between cyclosporine and hearing loss.
Objectives:
Renal transplant provides a long-term survival. Hearing impairment is a major factor in subjective health status. Status of hearing and the cause of hearing impairment in the pediatric renal transplant group have not been evaluated. Here, we studied to evaluate hearing status in pediatric renal transplant patients and to determine the factors that cause hearing impairment.
Materials And Methods:
Twenty-seven pediatric renal transplant recipients were investigated. All patients underwent audiologic assessment by means of pure-tone audiometry. The factors on hearing impairment were performed.
Results:
Sensorineural hearing impairment was found in 17 patients. There was marked hearing impairment for the higher frequencies between 4000 and 8000 Hz. Sudden hearing loss developed in 2 patients, 1 of them had tinnitus. Decrease of speech understanding was found in 8 patients. The cyclosporine level was significantly high in patients with hearing impairment compared with group without hearing impairment. Cyclosporine levels also were found to be statistically significantly high when compared with the group with decrease of speech understanding and the group without decrease of speech understanding. Similar relations cannot be found between tacrolimus levels and hearing impairment and speech understanding.
Conclusions:
Sensorineural hearing impairment prevalence was high in pediatric renal transplant recipients when compared with the general population of children. Cyclosporine may be responsible for causing hearing impairment after renal transplant. We suggest that this effect is a dose-dependent toxicity.
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