This is a device that can help people with hearing loss related to the middle ear bones on either both ears or just one ear. An implant that is similar to a screw is placed in the skull. Sounds are transmitted by a specialized hearing aid to the skull and then to the hearing nerve. This helps bypass the middle ear bones.
This device has several names it is also referred to as an auditory osseointegrated implant (AOI), osseointegrated bone conduction device (OBCD).
When done alone, the goal of this operation is to widen the ear canal to facilitate cleaning, decrease the number of external ear infections, and prevent wax impaction. This operation is often done in connection with a tympanoplasty and mastoidectomy.
The mastoid is an area of bone behind the ear canal and middle ear space. It is usually sponge like and filled with pockets of air. A mastoidectomy can be performed alone or with a tympanoplasty/repair of ear drum. A mastoidectomy refers to removing the sponge like bone.
This operation can help with recurrent infections of the ear, or with cholesteatoma - skin which has grown into the bone.
Myringotomy refers to making a cut in the ear drum. Tympanostomy tube insertion refers to placing a tube in the cut made in the ear.
This helps children with frequent ear infections (recurrent acute otitis media). There are many names for this procedure including pressure equalization tubes (PE tube) insertion and ear tube insertion.
When hearing loss is related to the middle ear bones being fixed (not moving) or disarticulated (not attached to each other), this operation helps to re-attach the bones or replace them with a prosthesis to improve hearing.
This is a specific operation for a condition called otosclerosis. In otosclerosis, hearing loss is related to the third ear bone or “stapes” not being able to move. In this operation, the ear drum is lifted like in a tympanoplasty; we remove a middle ear bone called the stapes and create an opening into the inner ear. A prosthesis is then placed to reconnect the ear bones to the inner ear.
This term describes a surgery involving the ear drum. Most often “tympanoplasty” refers to repairing an ear drum hole/perforation.
The perforation is usually the result of previous infections, trauma, or ear tubes. Imagine the lid of a jar having a hole in it. We lift the lid off the jar and place a repair over the opening of the jar and place the lid back down. In surgery, we lift the ear drum up, and place a repair under the drum and place the lid back down. The repair is usually a graft from the patient’s own body of either cartilage from the ear or the lining of muscle.
Hearing difficulties may be related to the inner ear as a result of working in a noisy work place for many years, getting older, sudden hearing loss due to inflammation or inheriting the hearing loss through their family. Usually people have hearing loss in both ears, but the hearing loss can also be worse in on ear than the other or in just one ear. Usually people can use a hearing aid but sometimes operations can be beneficial.
This is a device that helps patients with hearing in only one ear. An operation is performed where an implant screw is placed in the skull on the side with the deaf ear. A hearing device can then transmit sound through the screw, then the skull to the patients good ear on the either side of the head. This helps the patient hear on the side of the head without hearing.
A cochlear implant is a device that restores hearing by directly stimulating the hearing nerve in the inner ear (cochlea). Patient with hearing loss related to damage to the inner ear usually do well with hearing aids. When the hearing loss is extremely severe and hearing aids no longer help, patients can undergo this operation. This operation is usually performed by a neurotologist. A cochlear implant can help people with hearing in only one ear, severe hearing loss in one ear and moderate hearing loss in the other ear.
An acoustic neuroma (a.k.a. a vestibular schwannoma) is a small benign (non-cancerous) tumor of the hearing nerve in the skull. These are not tumors that are life threatening but grow slowly. They can be treated in multiple ways, including watchful waiting/observation, surgery or radiation therapy (stereo tactic radio-surgery).
This is an operation performed to remove a tumor of the hearing nerve within the skull. Often this operation is performed by a team of surgeons including a otolaryngologist/neurotologist and a neurosurgeon. There are many different types of this operation depending upon the way the tumor is surgically accessed. There are the translabyrinthine approach, retrosigmoid or sub occipital approach and the middle cranial fossa approach.