Operation FIRST , Cambodia’s rehabilitation surgical wing of Chea Chumeas hospital, co-founded and supported by Rose Charities Canada and Australia is rapidly becoming one of Cambodia’s leading ear surgery centers. Suppor in this area from IMPACT has been pivotal in moving this forward. Many forms of deafness can be fully or partially treated or assisted but often in poor countries these factilities are not available to the poor.
One form of deafness is caused by damage to the ‘hair cells’ deep within the ear canal. These specialized cells have hair-like structures which enable them to pick up sound vibrations. Though necessary for hearing in mamals, these structures are easily damaged by loud noise. Such noise may be from the rifle shots, bombs or explosions of conflict situations experienced in all to many countries and these can cause such damage to the cells that deafness is the result.
Now, Dr David He at Nebraska University has shown that gene therapy can, if given early reverse damage to the har cells. If the gene ‘Math1’ is injected linked to an appropriate virus to enable its penetration into the cells, function can be restored. At the moment, the treatment has only been tested in laboratory conditions and will only work up to 10 days after the damage. Work however continues in this promising area.
