Introduction and Definitions

In spite of the apparently clear task which has been set, the structure of any report on the clinical aspects of inner ear (sensorineural) deafness must put up with certain logical contradictions. It is impossible to find a classification purely according to the etiology or only according to the type of reaction of the inner ear, or perhaps only according to age. Although infantile deafness and senile deafness will be discussed separately, low tone deafness, too, will be dealt with in a separate chapter, and etiologic distinctions will be made between ototoxic, metabolic and noise-induced deafness. The report is to refer to deafness as a symptom of disease of the inner ear the inner ear as the origin of deafness.