Study of age-influences on brainstem auditory evoked potentials in healthy adults

International Journal of Biomedical Research

Sangeeta Gupta¹  Surjit Singh²  Gaurav Gupta³ 

[1] Associate Professor, Department of Physiology, Maharishi Markandeshwar Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Mullana, Ambala, Haryana, India;Professor, Department of Physiology, MMIMSR, Mullana, Ambala, Haryana;Professor, Department of Surgery, MMIMSR, Mullana, Ambala, Haryana

关键词: Brainstem auditory evoked potentials;    Absolute latency;    Interpeak latency.;   

DOI  :  10.7439/ijbr.v7i5.3241

学科分类：基础医学

来源: Scholar Science Journals

【 摘 要 】

Background and objectives: Brainstem auditory evoked potentials (BAEPs) have widespread clinical utility. BAEP responses exhibit a normal variability due to various non-pathologic factors and age is one of the variables suggested to have considerable influence on normal BAEP responses. Aging changes in the auditory system may significantly influence the interpretation of the auditory brainstem responses in comparison with younger adults. Hence, the study was planned to evaluate the influence of age on absolute and interpeak latencies in healthy subjects in the age-group of 18-70 years.Methods: The test was conducted on 150 healthy adults in the age-group of 18-70 years (75 males and 75 females). BAEP latencies were compared in different age groups by one way ANOVA. Correlations of latencies with age were performed using Pearson correlation coefficient. P value<0.05 was considered as statistically significant.Results: Absolute latencies of all BAEP waves (I, II, III, IV and V) increased with age. Interpeak latency I-III and I-V increased significantly with age but a decrease was found in subjects with 58-70 years of age. III-V interpeak latency variations were insignificant till the group with 48 years of subjects but exhibited a significant decrease in subjects with >48 years of age.Conclusion: Age contributes to the normal variations in BAEP latencies. Acquisition of a normative data for different age-groups can improve the clinical utility of the test. The pattern of interpeak latency changes with age in the present study indicates a greater possibility of involvement of peripheral auditory functions in the elderly subjects.

【 授权许可】

CC BY