Academic literature on the topic 'Short increment sensitivity index. Cochlea'

Consultants and more senior co-resident physicians at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) would call him “Caloy.” Hardly would I hear anybody (including our ENT department secretary) address him as Dr. Reyes. This was not because he was not a respected faculty member. Rather, he was everybody’s friend and he probably preferred to be addressed by his nickname.
 Dr. Carlos P. Reyes was a tall, friendly guy, easily recognizable while walking through the short PGH corridor stretching from the old ENT Ward (Ward 3) to the old ENT operating room (OR) called Floor 15, later designated as the PGH Nursing Office. He would almost always be holding either an expensive photography camera, electronic gadget, ENT OR instrument, or car magazines – suggesting his varied interests aside from having good knowledge of Otolaryngology, particularly Otology. He would usually stop and chat with an acquaintance about his new medical or non-medical interests.
 I first met Dr. Caloy when I was the first year resident assigned to the Otology section. He would call me “Ging” while presenting the ear patients at the outpatient department (OPD) Ear Clinic, only to learn later that he would address all unfamiliar persons by that name. He was kind, helpful and very understanding. Equipped with ample information in Otology he gathered from postgraduate studies abroad, he would selflessly share these with the residents in order to sharpen our diagnostic acumen. He would instruct us to rely on concise yet complete clinical examination, involving audiologic evaluation tools and meager radiologic information in considering differential diagnoses. He was quite willing to assist us in our learning processes, particularly on how to distinguish middle ear from inner ear disorders, and cochlear versus retrocochlear diseases. Since we did not have any audiologist at that time, he admonished us to carry out the needed audiometric evaluations on our ear patients ourselves in order to learn both the techniques of the procedures and their limitations. Hence, after the OPD clinic we would not only perform routine pure tone and speech audiometric tests but also special examinations like the Bekesy test, short increment sensitivity index (SISI) test, alternate binaural loudness balance (ABLB) test and the test for tone decay. We would then discuss the test results during our next ear clinic and we would listen and be amazed at how Dr. Caloy would integrate the information and arrive at the complex diagnosis.
 Dr. Caloy was our mentor at the time when refinements in tympanoplasty and mastoidectomy aroused the excitement and imagination of budding otologists worldwide. Whereas canal down mastoidectomy was the usual norm to safely remove common mastoid pathology like cholesteatoma, Dr. Caloy introduced the concept of intact canal wall mastoidectomy that avoids or mitigates recurrent postoperative cleaning of the mastoid bone. The period was also the dawn of neuro-otology when Dr. William House popularized the transmastoid approach for acoustic neuroma and the endolymphatic mastoid shunt as treatment for Meniere’s disease. In order to teach us the anatomical and surgical principles of performing these procedures, Dr. Caloy set up the first temporal bone dissection laboratory in the country at the mezzanine above the ENT conference room. He would offer the course to all ENT residents-in-training and consultants nationwide. He practically revolutionized the method of otologic surgery by requiring ENT surgeons to practice doing ear surgery in the temporal bone dissection lab prior to performing ear surgeries in the operating room. In addition, he advocated the use of the operating microscope and dental drills in place of the old bone gouges, chisels and bone ronguers. His ideas were later adopted by other ENT training institutions as we see today. The requirement that every ENT resident must undergo temporal bone dissection in the course of his training obviously stemmed from the efforts of Dr. Caloy. Many senior ENT consultants who are still with us today were former students of Dr. Caloy in his temporal bone lab
 Unfortunately, before finishing my residency training, Dr Caloy expeditiously left the PGH ENT department for unknown reasons. He then set up his private clinic in Quezon City and later joined the ENT department of University of Santo Tomas.
 Reflecting on the significant yet probably unknown achievements of Dr. Caloy toward the advancement of otology and neuro-otology in our country, I realize how blessed I was to be one of his students during that brief period when he was still with us at UP-PGH.
 With our profound gratitude Sir, we will always remember you.

Deciding between palliative and overly aggressive therapies for advanced cancer patients who present to the emergency department (ED) with acute issues requires a prediction of their short-term survival. Various scoring systems have previously been studied in hospices or intensive care units, though they are unsuitable for use in the ED. We aim to examine the use of a shock index (SI) in predicting the 60-day survival of advanced cancer patients presenting to the ED. Identified high-risk patients and their families can then be counseled accordingly. Three hundred and five advanced cancer patients who presented to the EDs of three tertiary hospitals were recruited, and their data retrospectively analyzed. Relevant data regarding medical history and clinical presentation were extracted, and respective shock indices calculated. Multivariate logistic regression analyses were performed. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were plotted to evaluate the predictive performance of the SI. Nonsurvivors within 60 days had significantly lower body temperatures and blood pressure, as well as higher pulse rates, respiratory rates, and SI. Each 0.1 SI increment had an odds ratio of 1.39 with respect to 60-day mortality. The area under the ROC curve was 0.7511. At the optimal cut-off point of 0.94, the SI had 81.38% sensitivity and 73.11% accuracy. This makes the SI an ideal evaluation tool for rapidly predicting the 60-day mortality risk of advanced cancer patients presenting to the ED. Identified patients can be counseled accordingly, and they can be assisted in making informed decisions on the appropriate treatment goals reflective of their prognoses.

Purpose Alterations in primary auditory functioning have been reported in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). Despite the current findings, the pathophysiological mechanisms underlying these alterations remain unclear, and the effect of dopaminergic medication on auditory functioning in PD has been explored insufficiently. Therefore, this study aimed to systematically investigate primary auditory functioning in patients with PD by using both subjective and objective audiological measurements. Method In this case–control study, 25 patients with PD and 25 age-, gender-, and education-matched healthy controls underwent an audiological test battery consisting of tonal audiometry, short increment sensitivity index, otoacoustic emissions (OAEs), and speech audiometry. Patients with PD were tested in the on- and off-medication states. Results Increased OAE amplitudes were found when patients with PD were tested without dopaminergic medication. In addition, speech audiometry in silence and multitalker babble noise demonstrated higher phoneme scores for patients with PD in the off-medication condition. The results showed no differences in auditory functioning between patients with PD in the on-medication condition and healthy controls. No effect of disease stage or motor score was evident. Conclusions This study provides evidence for a top-down involvement in auditory processing in PD at both central and peripheral levels. Most important, the increase in OAE amplitude in the off-medication condition in PD is hypothesized to be linked to a dysfunction of the olivocochlear efferent system, which is known to have an inhibitory effect on outer hair cell functioning. Future studies may clarify whether OAEs may facilitate an early diagnosis of PD.

Hearing loss is a common finding in patients with end-stage renal failure. Uremic toxins, ototoxins, and axonal uremic neuropathy appear to be likely pathogenic factors. We analyzed whether an improvement in hearing capacity can be achieved with an improvement of anemia by erythropoietin (EPO) administration. Fifty patients on long-term hemodialysis in a single center were examined audiologically by otoscopy, tympanometry, pure tone audiometry, and the short increment sensitivity index. Twenty-five patients were treated with EPO in a dose of 120 U/kg per week over a period of 5 to 8 months, and the remaining 25 patients were not treated with EPO (controls). Both groups were reexamined audiologically after the study period, and the results were compared. In the group treated with EPO, the hemoglobin level increased from 7 ± 0.9 to 11 ± 0.8 g/dL, as against the control group, whose hemoglobin increased from 7.1 ± 0.9 to 8 ± 0.8 g/dL. The audiologic tests were repeated at the end of the study period, and a significant improvement of hearing was found in the patients treated with EPO as compared with the control group (p < .001). Our study suggests that improvement of anemia in patients on long-term hemodialysis by administration of EPO is associated with an improvement in hearing capacity in a significant number of patients. Thus, anemia seems to be an important factor responsible for hearing disorders in patients with end-stage renal failure. Studies with larger numbers of patients are required to confirm this observation.