Auditory brainstem response and cortical auditory evoked potentials in patients with misophonia

Abstract Background Misophonia, also known as selective sound sensitivity syndrome, is a persistent condition characterized by adverse emotional reactions and autonomic arousal triggered by particular sounds. The purpose of this study is to investigate the auditory pathway processing in persons with misophonia using click auditory brainstem response (ABR) and cortical auditory evoked potentials (CAEPs). This study included 20 healthy controls and 20 patients with misophonia diagnosed according to the misophonia diagnostic criteria of Schroder et al. (2013). All subjects were subjected to a full audiological evaluation including pure tone audiometry (PTA) with detection of uncomfortable loudness level (UCLL) and most comfortable loudness level (MCLL), immitancemetry, cortical auditory evoked potentials (CAEPs) and auditory brainstem response (ABR). Results Both UCLL and MCLL were higher in patients with misophonia than the healthy controls and CAEPs results had earlier P1 and N1 waves and larger P1 and P2 amplitudes in frequencies 500, 1000, 2000, and 4000 Hz in the misophonia group. Conclusion Misophonia patients have significant findings in CAEPs waves’ amplitudes and latencies together with MCLL and UCLL.