Inhibition of Brain Area and Functional Connectivity in Idiopathic Sudden Sensorineural Hearing Loss With Tinnitus, Based on Resting-State EEG

This study aimed to identify the mechanism behind idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss (ISSNHL) in patients with tinnitus by investigating aberrant activity in areas of the brain and functional connectivity. High-density electroencephalography (EEG) was used to investigate central nervous changes in 25 ISSNHL subjects and 27 healthy controls. ISSNHL subjects had significantly reduced activity in the left frontal lobe at the alpha 2 frequency band compared with controls. Linear lagged connectivity and lagged coherence analysis showed significantly reduced functional connectivity between the temporal gyrus and supramarginal gyrus at the gamma 2 frequency band in the ISSNHL group. Additionally, a significantly reduced functional connectivity was found between the central cingulate gyrus and frontal lobe under lagged phase synchronization analysis. These results strongly indicate inhibition of brain area activity and change in functional connectivity in ISSNHL with tinnitus patients.