ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Aging
Sec. Musculoskeletal Aging
Muscle Quality Correlates with Hearing Thresholds: A Cross-Sectional Analysis
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Family Medicine, Ulsan University Hospital, Ulsan, Republic of Korea
- 2Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Ulsan University Hospital, Ulsan, Republic of Korea
- 3Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Ulsan University Hospital, Ulsan, Republic of Korea
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INTRODUCTION: Muscle health, including muscle volume, is an independent risk factor for physical disability and metabolic disorders. Although low muscle mass has been linked to hearing loss, the association between CT-derived muscle quality and hearing has not been explored. METHODS: This cross-sectional study examined associations between abdominal body composition and hearing thresholds in 7,774 adults (4,537 men and 3,237 women) aged ≥40 years undergoing routine health check-ups. Abdominopelvic CT and pure-tone audiometry were performed, and total abdominal muscle area (TAMA), normal-attenuation muscle area (NAMA), low-attenuation muscle area (LAMA), intermuscular adipose tissue (IMAT), visceral fat area (VFA), and subcutaneous fat area (SFA) were quantified from CT-based muscle quality maps. Best-ear pure-tone average (PTA, 1–4 kHz) was analyzed as loge-transformed PTA. Multivariable linear regression models were fitted separately for men and women, adjusting for age, cardiovascular risk factors, and lifestyle variables. RESULTS Loge-transformed LAMA index was independently associated with hearing in both sexes. Each 10% increase in the loge-transformed LAMA index corresponded to an estimated 0.11 dB worsening of PTA in men and 0.14 dB worsening in women. In women, TAMA, NAMA, and VFA indices were associated with PTA; these associations were confined to women in their 50s and 60s in decade-stratified analyses. No abdominal body composition indices were significantly associated with hearing thresholds in any age group among men. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that abdominal body composition are linked to age-related hearing loss, particularly in midlife women, and highlight skeletal muscle health as a potential target for hearing preservation.
Keywords: Abdominal Muscles, Attenuation (absorption) coefficient, computed tomography, Hearing, Sarcopenia
Received: 16 Sep 2025; Accepted: 08 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Jeon, Lee, Kang and Kwon. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Joong Keun Kwon
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