Cent Eur J Public Health 2024, 32(4):251-255 | DOI: 10.21101/cejph.a8218

Influence of smoking on human hearing – literature review

Karol Myszel¹, Piotr Henryk Skarżyński^{2, 3, 4}

¹ Centre of Hearing and Speech, Kajetany, Nadarzyn, Poland

² Department of Tele-audiology and Screening, World Hearing Centre, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland

³ Institute of Sensory Organs, Kajetany, Nadarzyn, Poland

⁴ Heart Failure and Cardiac Rehabilitation Department, Faculty of Dental Medicine, Medical University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland

Objectives: Smoking is a strong addiction, that affects a huge number of people worldwide, including the young ones. Due to composition of cigarette smoke, which contains nicotine and other chemical substances, lots of harmful effects on human health were described. Apart from the influence on other organs smoking is associated with hearing loss.

Methods: The literature review was conducted using PubMed and the combination of the following words: smoking, hearing impairment and hearing loss.

Results: The total number of 585 articles published in the recent 10 years were analysed. The review results show a strong association of hearing loss with smoking, both active and passive. As the main reason for hearing loss, a damage to outer hair cells was identified. Hearing loss in such cases is basically sensorineural and usually affects high frequencies. It was also observed that the risk of hearing loss increases with time of smoking. Smoking cessation reduces the risk of hearing loss associated with smoking. This article is a review of the literature that summarizes the results of studies aiming to analyse the influence of smoking on human hearing.

Conclusions: As smoking causes serious health problems, public health policies in societies should promote primary prevention as well as smoking cessation (secondary prevention) to diminish the total burden of healthcare systems.

Klíčová slova: smoking, hearing impairment, hearing loss, cochlear dysfunction, otoacoustic emissions

Vloženo: 13. březen 2024; Revidováno: 29. září 2024; Přijato: 29. září 2024; Zveřejněno: 30. prosinec 2024  Zobrazit citaci