Why the study?
Given the widespread prevalence of smoking, it was necessary to evaluate whether auditory brainstem response data must be interpreted in light of smoker or nonsmoker status.
Does smoking alter auditory pathways as measured by Auditory Brainstem Responses in healthy males?
Does smoking alter auditory pathways as measured by Auditory Brainstem Responses in healthy males?
Smoking adversely affects the auditory pathway by increasing latency and decreasing amplitude of Auditory Brainstem Responses, indicating smoking status should be considered a confounding variable in ABR interpretation.
Answers are grounded in this paper and cite their sources.
Smoking status should be considered when interpreting ABR; this Level 5 observational comparison leaves open causal effects on auditory pathways.
Objectives: Auditory Brainstem Responses (ABR) are used for assessment of integrity of auditory pathway. Given the widespread prevalence of smoking, interpretation of ABR data must be done in light of smoker/nonsmoker status. Materials and Methods: The present study was done on 30 normal, healthy non-smoker males and 30 healthy, smoker males in the age group of 18-40 years. Approval of Institutional Ethics Committee and written informed consent was taken from all volunteers. ABR was recorded using Biopac MP 150 system. The recordings were done in a state of abstinence of 12 hours (chronic smoking state) and 10 minutes after smoking (acute smoking state). In the non-smoker group, only one set of recordings were done. The peak latencies and amplitudes of the ABR waves were analyzed. Results: Analysis of data revealed a significant prolongation of the latencies of wave I and II and Inter-peak latency I-III in chronic smoking state as compared to non-smoking state. The amplitudes of waves I, II and V were also significantly reduced in chronic smoking state. A comparison between the non-smokers and acute smoking state revealed significantly prolonged latency of waves I and II in the acute smoking state accompanied by a significant decrease in the amplitudes of all waves of ABR. There were no significant differences in latencies and amplitudes of the chronic and acute smoking state. Conclusion: Smoking led to an increase in latency and decrease in amplitude, thereby indicating that it adversely affected the auditory pathway. Thus, interpretation of data of ABR should consider smoking as a confounding variable.
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Dixit et al. (2020) studied this question.
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