Vestibular myogenic potentials of athletes for the Deaf Olympic Games with congenital profound hearing loss.
CONCLUSIONS
Our study revealed that VEMPs in responses to clicks and 500 Hz STB were abnormal in 25% of athletes with congenital profound sensorineural hearing loss for the Deaf Olympic Games. These results confirm that a part of deaf athletes with congenital vestibular failure is well compensated for higher level sport activities.


OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to investigate the appearance rate of VEMP, vestibular failure and its compensation in Japanese deaf athletes by the VEMP test, caloric test and balance test.


METHODS
Sixteen subjects among the Deaf Olympic Games athletes of Japan volunteered to participate in this study. All the subjects have congenital profound sensorineural hearing loss.


RESULTS
In the VEMP test, 24 ears (75%) showed normal click-evoked responses, 5 ears (16%) showed decreased click-evoked responses, 3 ears (9%) showed no click-evoked responses, 28 ears (87.5%) showed normal 500 Hz short tone burst (STB)-evoked responses and 4 ears (12.5%) showed decreased responses. In the ice-water caloric test, 11 subjects (69%) showed normal responses bilaterally, 3 subjects showed bilateral responses with asymmetrical responses and 2 subjects (12%) showed no response bilaterally. All the subjects showed normal balance test results.
Jin
Yulian
Y
National Institute of Sensory Organs, National Tokyo Medical Center, Tokyo, Japan.
Munetaka
Ushio
U
Hayasi
Akimasa
A
Takegoshi
Hideki
H
Nakajima
Yukinori
Y
Kaga
Kimitaka
K
D000328:Adult; D056352:Athletes; D002150:Caloric Tests; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005071:Evoked Potentials; D005260:Female; D006319:Hearing Loss, Sensorineural / Q000151:congenital / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D014725:Vestibular Nerve / Q000503:physiopathology*; D014722:Vestibule, Labyrinth / Q000503:physiopathology*; D055815:Young Adult