Link Between Hearing Impairment and Heart Failure Risk Identified

Recent research has uncovered a significant association between hearing impairment and an increased risk of developing heart failure. The study, published in the journal Heart, indicates that the relationship is partly influenced by psychological factors.

Conducted by a team at the State Key Laboratory of Organ Failure Research in Guangzhou, China, the study analyzed data from 164,431 participants in the U.K. Biobank. All participants were free of heart failure at the beginning of the study. Hearing ability was assessed using the Digit Triplets Test, which measures speech-in-noise hearing capabilities through a metric known as the speech-reception-threshold (SRT).

Over a median follow-up period of 11.7 years, 2.7% of participants developed heart failure. The findings revealed that higher SRT levels, indicative of poorer hearing, were linked to an elevated risk of heart failure, with an adjusted hazard ratio of 1.05 per standard deviation increment. Participants identified as having insufficient or poor hearing, as well as those who utilized hearing aids, exhibited a greater risk compared to individuals with normal hearing. The adjusted hazard ratios were 1.15 for insufficient hearing, 1.28 for poor hearing, and 1.26 for hearing aid users.

Notably, the analysis indicated that approximately 16.9% of the connection between SRT levels and heart failure risk was mediated by psychological distress, with social isolation and neuroticism accounting for an additional 3.0% and 3.1%, respectively. Participants who did not have coronary heart disease or stroke at the study's outset displayed a stronger correlation.

The authors of the study suggest that if these findings are validated in future research, hearing impairment could serve as a potential risk factor or indicator for heart failure in the general population. This underscores the need to incorporate hearing health assessments into broader cardiovascular risk evaluation strategies.

For further details, please refer to the study published in Heart.