Increased prevalence of hearing loss, tinnitus and sudden deafness among patients with Sjögren’s syndrome

BackgroundThis study aimed to provide an updated prevalence of hearing loss, tinnitus, vertigo and sudden deafness on patients with Sjögren’s syndrome and matched comparison patients.MethodsData for this study were retrieved from the Taiwan Longitudinal Health Insurance Database and Taiwan’s registered catastrophic illness dataset. This study included 20 266 patients with Sjögren’s syndrome as the study group and 60 798 propensity score-matched comparison patients as the comparison group. We used multivariable logistic regressions to estimate the ORs and 95% CI for tinnitus, hearing loss, vertigo and sudden deafness among Sjögren’s syndrome patients versus comparison patients.Resultsχ2 tests showed there were statistically significant differences between the study group and comparison group in the prevalence of tinnitus (10.1% vs 6.3%, p