HHIssues

Source: HOH-LD-News, Vol. VI, Issue 13, March 31, 2001

Patient Regains Some Hearing Through Blood Filtering

Every so often, we stumble on a bizarre hearing loss "cure" that we like to share with our readers. Some of them are probably bogus, while others may be surprisingly effective. The Kansas City Star recently reported the case of a man named Will Standley, whose hearing was partially restored through blood filtering.

Mr. Standley woke up one night with his head spinning and unable to hear in his right ear. The standard treatments for sudden hearing loss (including steroids and anti-viral drugs) failed to restore his hearing. In the course of researching hearing loss on the internet, Mr. Standley learned that cholesterol filtering has been found by German researchers to restore hearing in some patients with sudden hearing loss. At a loss for other treatment, Mr. Standley drove to the University of Kansas Medical Center for the experimental procedure.

It seems to have worked!

The filtering process was originally developed to treat people whose high cholesterol cannot be handled using standard techniques. The technique filters the LDL (bad cholesterol) from the blood.

When doctors performed the procedure on Mr. Standley, he noticed a reduction in tinnitus before the procedure was even complete. Standard hearing tests conducted before and after the filtering showed a dramatic increase in his hearing following the procedure.

Doctors speculate on reasons that blood filtering restores partial) hearing in some cases, but they really don't know why it works.

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