The Incidence of Sensorineural Hearing Loss Diagnoses in People with and without Parkinson's Disease.

Cohort studyMovement disorders clinical practice· Aug 2026

The Incidence of Sensorineural Hearing Loss Diagnoses in People with and without Parkinson's Disease.

Kaisa Hokkinen, Aarno Dietz, Pasi Lampela … Anna-Maija Tolppanen

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Otology & HearingCohort studyClinical practiceQ2IF 2.2

After Parkinson's diagnosis, new hearing loss diagnoses become less frequent than in controls

The Incidence of Sensorineural Hearing Loss Diagnoses in People with and without Parkinson's Disease.

Kaisa Hokkinen … Anna-Maija Tolppanen

Movement disorders clinical practice · Aug 2026

Background

Parkinson's disease (PD) and sensorineural hearing loss (sensorineural hearing loss) are both prevalent conditions among older adults.

Purpose

To evaluate the temporal changes in the amount of sensorineural hearing loss diagnoses in relation to PD diagnosis.

Methods

This nationwide register-based study included 22,189 community-dwelling persons who received a clinically verified PD diagnosis in 1996-2015 in Finland and a 1:1 matched comparison cohort.

n = 22,189 community-dwelling persons

Results

hearing loss diagnoses drop off after Parkinson's, unlike in controls

HR 0.78 (95% CI 0.74 to 0.83)

CI excludes the null - significant

More results

Before PD diagnosis the incidence of sensorineural hearing loss diagnosis was higher among people with PD (0.65/100 person-years) than in the comparison cohort (0.58/100 person-years, hazard ratio, 95% CI 1.11, 1.05-1.18) and increased similarly in both groups.

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Conclusion · 1 of 2

After PD diagnosis, the incidence of sensorineural hearing loss appears to decline compared to the control group, suggesting a possible deprioritization of hearing care.

Conclusion · 2 of 2

Our findings are also consistent with previous research showing an association between sensorineural hearing loss and PD, with a higher incidence of sensorineural hearing loss observed in individuals with PD.

The Incidence of Sensorineural Hearing Loss Diagnoses in People with and without Parkinson's Disease.

The Incidence of Sensorineural Hearing Loss Diagnoses in People with and without Parkinson's Disease.

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