[Evaluation of individual prognosis in sudden deafness]

Based on a recently published paper, we attempted to assess the individual prognosis for patients suffering from sudden deafness. We selected several factors of importance in the prognosis: Positive-Factors: no deafness, no vestibular dysfunction, therapy began within 4 days, and not more than one vascular risk factor. Negative-Factors: deafness, objective vestibular dysfunction, therapy began later than 21 days and more than one vascular risk factor. Every patient was examined and given a positive or negative score between +4 and -4. According to these results a good prognosis (in 70%) can be expected for patients with at least one positive factor, whereas poor prognosis was found (in 75%) of patients without a positive-factor.