Deafness is not necessarily hereditary. Whether deafness is hereditary or not is related to the type of disease in which deafness occurs, for example, deafness caused by acquired trauma is not hereditary.
Deafness can occur as a result of both congenital and acquired deafness. Congenital deafness can be caused by genetic and chromosomal abnormalities. Hereditary deafness can be transmitted by autosomal dominant inheritance, autosomal recessive inheritance, and X chromosome inheritance.
Acquired deafness is less likely to be passed on to the offspring if there are no genetic factors, such as trauma, e.g. temporal bone fracture with disruption of the auditory ossicular chain, otitis media with large perforation of the tympanic membrane, etc., which are generally not hereditary.
Currently, genetic diagnostic techniques can be used to test deafness genes to find the causative gene, which is an important way to prevent and intervene in the inheritance of deafness genes.