Relationship Between Peripheral Blood NOX3 and TGFB1 Gene Expression Levels and Hearing Loss in Workers Exposed to Occupational Noise

LI Li; ZHANG Rui; QU Lu; DING Li

doi:10.3969/j.issn.1004-437X.2025.16.014

Abstract：Objective To analyze the relationship between the expression levels of NADPH oxidase 3(NOX3)and transforming factor-β1(TGFB1)genes and noise-induced hearing loss(NIHL)in the peripheral blood of workers exposed to occupational noise.Methods A total of 110 occupational noise exposure workers undergoing physical examination in the Third People's Hospital of Henan Province were selected as the research group,and those with an average hearing threshold of more than 25 dB(A)in binaural high frequency(3,4,6 kHz)were selected as the NIHL group(32 cases),and those with a hearing threshold of 25 dB(A)or less in binaural frequency(0.5,1,2 kHz)were selected as the non-NIHL group(78 cases).At the same time,non-occupational noise exposure workers undergoing health examination in the Third People's Hospital of Henan Province were selected as the control group.The pure tone audiometry results and general data of subjects were collected,the expression levels of NOX3 and TGFB1 genes in peripheral blood were detected by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction,the receiver operating characteristic(ROC)curve was drawn to evaluate the value of peripheral blood NOX3 and TGFB1 gene levels in predicting the occurrence of NIHL,and multivariate logistic regression was performed to analyze the factors affecting the occurrence of NIHL.Results The expression level of NOX3 gene in peripheral blood of the control group,non-NIHL group and NIHL group decreased gradually(P＜0.05),and the expression level of TGFB1 gene gradually increased(P＜0.05).The ROC curves showed that when the two were detected separately,the area under the curve(AUC)was 0.668 and 0.927,respectively,which had a certain predictive value,and the combined detection AUC was 0.981,which had higher clinical value.The proportion of smoking and high-frequency hearing threshold in the NIHL group were higher than those in the non-NIHL group(P＜0.05),and further multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the basic expression levels of peripheral blood NOX3 and TGFB1 were factors affecting the occurrence of NIHL(P＜0.05).Conclusion The expression of NOX3 gene in the peripheral blood of workers exposed to occupational noise exposure is low,and TGFB1 gene is highly expressed,especially in NIHL patients,which can be used as a potential indicator for clinical prediction of NIHL.