Scientific Reports (Apr 2021)

Self-reported and cotinine-verified smoking and increased risk of incident hearing loss

  • Woncheol Lee,
  • Yoosoo Chang,
  • Hocheol Shin,
  • Seungho Ryu

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-87531-1
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11, no. 1
pp. 1 – 9

Abstract

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Abstract We examined the associations of smoking status and urinary cotinine levels, an objective measure of smoking, with the development of new-onset HL. This cohort study was performed in 293,991 Korean adults free of HL who underwent a comprehensive screening examination and were followed for up to 8.8 years. HL was defined as a pure-tone average of thresholds at 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 kHz ≥ 25 dB in both ears. During a median follow-up of 4.9 years, 2286 participants developed new-onset bilateral HL. Self-reported smoking status was associated with an increased risk of new-onset bilateral HL. Multivariable-adjusted HRs (95% CIs) for incident HL comparing former smokers and current smokers to never-smokers were 1.14 (1.004–1.30) and 1.40 (1.21–1.61), respectively. Number of cigarettes, pack-years, and urinary cotinine levels were consistently associated with incident HL. These associations were similarly observed when introducing changes in smoking status, urinary cotinine, and other confounders during follow-up as time-varying covariates. In this large cohort of young and middle-aged men and women, smoking status based on both self-report and urinary cotinine level were independently associated with an increased incidence of bilateral HL. Our findings indicate smoking is an independent risk factor for HL.