Laura Maria De Luca
Dr. Laura Maria De Luca (born April 13, 1986) is a ENT Specialist based in Department of Medical, Surgical and Experimental Sciences, University of Sassari, Italy.
Throughout her career, Dr. De Luca has developed comprehensive clinical expertise in treating ear, nose, and throat disorders for both adult and pediatric patients. Her main areas of medical focus include:
Otology and Audiology: Extensive experience in managing adult and childhood hearing loss, hearing performance assessments, and vestibular disorders.
Rhinology: Diagnosis and medical treatment of allergic rhinitis, nasal polyposis, and sinus-related conditions.
Pediatric ENT: Specialized approach dedicated to younger patients, actively involved in neonatal screening and hearing surveillance protocols for Northern Sardinia and in hearing and vestibular rehabilitation.
Alongside her clinical practice, she has actively contributed to clinical research and academic publications in the fields of ENT disorders, otoneurology, and head and neck oncology, collaborating on peer-reviewed studies.
Session
Infectious still represent one of the leading non-genetic causes of childhood deafness.
For this reason, screening prevention campaigns for infections during pregnancy are in place in various countries and vaccination campaigns have played a significant role in prevention, as new pharmacological therapeutic approaches administered to infected mothers. Over the years, this has absolutely led to better control of infections and, consequently, better management of the impact on the hearing function.
Despite this, an uneven distribution of these risk factors across the world remains high today.
The treatment of virus-induced hearing loss faces several obstacles, probably because of different biofunctions and tropisms that each virus exploits that result in hearing loss.
Furthermore, temporary or permanent molecular effects of many other viruses on the auditory system have remained elusive both in adults and infants.
Some viruses rarely manifest as obvious congenital infections but might be capable of disturbing the embryonic or fetal development if they can cross the placental barrier during early pregnancy.
The exact mechanisms by which viruses cause hearing loss is still not clearly identified at molecular level.
Determining commonalities and differences in such molecular mechanisms helps to develop better therapies against viruses triggering hearing loss.
Hearing loss caused by these agents can occur in a variety of ways, being unilateral or bilateral, stable or progressive, and of varying degrees. There are also a number of late onset cases of hearing loss occuring during the early years of life and this underlines the importance of a continued surveillance.