What diseases cause deafness?

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What diseases cause deafness?

Deafness or hearing loss is a condition that affects many people, mainly older adults. It is estimated that one in three people over the age of 65 has severe hearing difficulties.

In children, hearing loss has a major impact on their development and learning ability.

In hearing, sound waves reaching our ears are amplified as they pass through the external auditory canal, the eardrum, and the ossicular chain, and are then converted into electrical impulses that are transmitted by the auditory nerve to the brain.

There are many causes of hearing loss.

Difficulty in propagating sound waves to the auditory nerve due to the external auditory canal, the tympanic membrane, or a cochlear disease (conductive or transmitted deafness).
Problems with the auditory nerve or brain that prevent it from forming or understanding nerve impulses correctly (sensorineural hearing loss)
A mixture of two changes (mixed deafness).

The causes of conductive or transmission hearing loss are:

Congenital (present at birth) absence of the external auditory canal (external auditory canal atresia).
Inflammation of the ear canal due to otitis externa or a tumor, the ear canal becomes blocked with wax, and a foreign body enters.
Perforation of the eardrum due to otitis media or trauma.
Changes in the ossicular chain due to infection or trauma.
Otitis media.
Presence of cholesteatoma.

Fluid or scarring in the middle ear.
Otosclerosis, which is the immobilization and stiffness of one of the small bones in the ear (the stapes), preventing proper sound flow and transmission. It is inherited in an autosomal dominant pattern (half of an affected person's offspring will inherit it), but penetrance is incomplete, meaning that not all people with the genetic defect will develop the disease. Hearing loss begins between the ages of 20 and 40, and in women the first diagnosis is made during pregnancy. It is improved by fitting a hearing aid or surgically separating the stapes. Sometimes the disease spreads to the cochlea (cochlear otosclerosis), resulting in mixed deafness.
There is a third window in the inner ear. Normally, there are two windows or openings between the inner ear and the middle ear. If a third opening forms, it can cause conductive hearing loss.