Gender differences in audio-vestibular disorders
Virginia Corazzi, Andrea Ciorba, Piotr H. Skarżyński, Magdalena B. Skarżyńska, Chiara Bianchini, Francesco Stomeo, Tiziana Bellini, Stefano Pelucchi, Stavros Hatzopoulos
Abstract
In the last years, the attention to the role of gender in physiopathology and pharmacology of diseases in several medical disciplines is rising; however, the data on the relationship between gender and audio-vestibular disorders are still inconclusive and sometimes confusing. With this letter to the editor, we would like to review the role of gender in audio-vestibular disorders. Literature data show that anatomic variances of the inner ear do exist in men and women and that the different physiology and/or hormonal influence between genders could produce different clinical outcome of routine audiological and vestibular tests. Beyond the epidemiological gender-related differences, the clinical data suggest that the gender has a potential role as an etiopathogenetic factor in audio-vestibular disorders and it is probably responsible for the different clinical features observed between male and female subjects.