Severe damage begins some four to five days after the initial exposure, giving researchers a window of opportunity to administer antioxidant drugs, said Street. The drugs work by binding to and incapacitating the harmful reactive oxygen. Hearing experts said that, depending on the length of exposure, noise around 120 decibels can damage hearing. While she knew of cases where patients had lost then regained their hearing after steroid treatments, no techniques exist to correct hearing loss due to inner ear damage. Anti-oxidant therapies have been reported in the medical journals for several years, said Steve Ackley, a professor in the department to audiology at Gallaudet.
Patients wear the device, which is about the size of a hearing aid, behind their ear.
The device dispenses the drug in intervals over a two week period. Before we can make this drug intervention useful for a wide number of people, we have to go through clinical trials. Street said the microcatheter is expensive so Navy officials are considering using pills or a series of injections to apply the antioxidants. Soldiers are especially vulnerable to noise-induced hearing loss, thanks to prolonged exposure to jets, cannons and heavy machinery. Copyright 2001 by United Press International.