Steroid Use for Sudden Sensorineural Hearing Loss: A CHEER Network Study

Abstract

Objective The objective of this study was to describe patterns of corticosteroid treatment for sudden sensorineural hearing loss and to evaluate effectiveness based on delivery mode (oral vs intratympanic vs both). Study Design Cross-sectional repeated measures. Setting Patients were recruited from practices within the Creating Healthcare Excellence through Education and Research (CHEER) Network. CHEER is a National Institutes of Health–funded nationwide network of 30 community and academic otolaryngology practice sites. Subjects and Methods A subset of 117 patients who had been treated with steroids for sudden sensorineural hearing loss were recruited from within a larger initial CHEER Network study on clinical practice guideline compliance. Outcomes included audiometric and speech scores and patient-perceived improvement. Descriptive analyses, Wilcoxon rank-sum tests, and Fisher exact tests were run. Results Two categories (oral and simultaneous oral + intratympanic) had adequate sample sizes to support statistical comparison of treatment results. Improvements were seen in both audiometry and speech testing scores; 57% of patients self-reported improvement perceived as either minor or major. There were no significant differences in degree of improvement between these treatment groups. Conclusions We observed that a majority of steroid-treated patients demonstrated hearing improvement, but this improvement did not meet criteria for statistical significance. As in other studies on this topic, the relatively small sample size may have prevented differentiation of effectiveness among steroid treatments. We propose that the use of alternative approaches, such as pragmatic clinical trials and multidisciplinary electronic health record systems and megadatabases, may hold the most promise for an approach to best practice development.