Obesity in adolescents is associated with a range of cardiovascular and other health risks. Now a new study adds one more: hearing loss.
Several studies have demonstrated the association of obesity with hearing loss in adults, but now researchers examining records of a nationwide sample of 1,488 boys and girls ages 12 to 19 have found the same association in teenagers. The study appeared online in The Laryngoscope.
The researchers controlled for various factors, including poverty, sex, race and previous exposure to loud noises. They found that being at or above the 95th percentile for body mass index — the definition of obesity in teenagers — was independently associated with poorer hearing over all frequencies, and with almost double the risk of low-frequency hearing loss in one ear. They suggest that this may represent an early stage of injury that will later progress to both ears, as it does in adults.
Continue reading this article in the New York Times.
