Medical Moment: Acoustic neuroma treatment

(WNDU) - Hearing loss, ringing in your ear, unexplained dizziness, many people might think it’s just the typical signs of aging.

But for some, these are signs of a tumor.

They’re called acoustic neuromas, and although rare, they can be life-changing, even life-threatening.

Julie Sifford and her daughter Eliza do just about everything together.

“We play soccer, we kick the ball around in the yard, we come to parks, she likes to throw football,” Julie said.

But when Julie started feeling lightheaded and dizzy, it became more difficult to do just about anything.

“I’d had some tinnitus, the ringing in my ear, that really started increasing over time,” she recalled. “I’d had some hearing loss and in my left ear and just assumed it was normal aging.”

An MRI revealed an acoustic neuroma, a small, non-cancerous tumor the size of a raisin, pressing on the main nerve connecting Julie’s ear to her brain.

“It’s like the covering of the wire that’s just growing out of control, and it damages hearing. It can get big enough to compress the brainstem,” explained Dr. Rick Friedman, a neurologist at UCSD.

Friedman and neurosurgeon Mark Schwartz specialize in removing these tumors.

“This is the tumor of the vestibular nerve sitting in the internal auditory canal,” Friedman said.

The key is to remove the tumor and preserve the hearing while not damaging any facial nerves.

“So, we make a window of bone here, elevate the brain off the floor, and this black is bone, and I remove that bone so we can get to the tumor from above and slide it out,” Friedman spoke.

“I knew, immediately, that I had preserved my hearing,” Julie finished.

Although Julie will not regain any hearing she’s already lost, she feels fortunate that it won’t get any worse. Her balance is improving, and she’s ready for the next soccer season to begin.

Acoustic neuromas are caused by the overproduction of Schwann cells in the nervous system.

Depending on the size of the tumor, patients have three options: wait and watch to see if the tumor grows, radiation, and surgery.

Surgery is the only option that will guarantee no more hearing will be lost.