Test-Retest Reliability of Tone Burst-Induced 500 Hz Air-Conduction Masseter Vestibular Evoked Myogenic Potential in Healthy Individuals.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Masseter vestibular evoked myogenic potential (mVEMP) is a newly developed tool which is used to assess the vestibulo-trigeminal neural and saccular functioning pathways. Recently, this test was added to a full test battery for evaluating the brainstem of people with neurological disorders and other vestibular diseases. For any test to qualify as a standard test, the test must have high reliability across all testing windows. Hence, the present study focused on validating the reliability of mVEMP in a large population.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS

The study included 50 healthy participants with normal hearing. All the participants were tested using mVEMP and underwent retest within a month after the initial test. All parameters (latencies, peak-to-peak amplitude, asymmetric ratio) were observed for both sessions. To determine the statistically significant differences between and across the sessions, non-parametric tests such as Mann-Whitney U and Wilcoxon signed-rank tests were used.

RESULTS

The test-retest reliability of all parameters were observed. The reliability was fair-to-good for P11 and N21 latencies. The other parameters showed less significance. There were no significant differences in sex and ear comparisons between and across the sessions.

CONCLUSIONS

Our study demonstrated that the mVEMP is a reliable test which can be used to assess peripheral vestibular system dysfunction and neurological conditions.