Is deafness a genetic disease?

Some babies are born without hearing and have no response to sounds. Without the help of hearing aids, they cannot communicate normally with others, which brings a great financial burden to the family. There are also cases where everything was normal before, they could communicate with others and speak fluently, but when they reached their teenage years, their hearing suddenly deteriorated and they later became deaf, causing great harm to the patients. So, what is going on? Is deafness a genetic disease?

Hereditary deafness accounts for 50% of all deaf children, and most of them are sensorineural deafness that is difficult to treat. If it is not discovered early, it will often seriously affect the effectiveness of rehabilitation training for deaf children. Many parents are reluctant to admit that their children have congenital hearing loss, thinking that this means there is something wrong with them and they feel guilty towards their children. In fact, if a child is born with hearing loss, it is not necessarily hereditary; on the contrary, hereditary hearing loss may only occur when the child grows up or even becomes an adult.

Hereditary deafness can be simply understood as deafness inherited from parents. If this is the case, why do some children born to congenitally deaf parents have no hearing impairments, while some parents with normal hearing give birth to deaf children? Some families may have several children born with deafness, while other families may only have one deaf person? In addition to the fact that some people's congenital deafness is not caused by genetic factors, another important reason for this phenomenon is that the inheritance of hereditary deafness is relatively complex, and its inheritance pattern cannot be seen only from the analysis of one family or one clan. The reason why there is a greater possibility of deaf children in marriages between close relatives is that the man and woman are closely related by blood, and the possibility of having the same characteristic chromosomes is much greater than in marriages between non-close relatives. The chance of harmful chromosome combinations is also much higher. According to theoretical analysis, cousins ​​are 78 times more likely to give birth to children with congenital deafness than those who marry non-consanguineous relatives. Therefore, marriage between close relatives should be strictly prohibited to ensure eugenics.

Several issues that should be noted in analyzing hereditary deafness

1. Hereditary deafness is not necessarily congenital. Many hereditary deafness are acquired, and some even occur only in middle age.

2. Not all hereditary deafness can be diagnosed through chromosome examination. The vast majority of monogenic hereditary deafness and polygenic hereditary deafness cannot be detected through chromosome examination at present.

For hereditary deafness, prevention is the key. Don't wait until the baby is born to regret it. You must not marry close relatives. If both of you are born with congenital deafness, don't get married. If you must get married, it's best not to have children. It will be a heavy blow not only to one family, but to several families. Both parties of the deafness patient should first undergo genetic analysis to see if it is hereditary.