Survey of the clinical use of electrocochleography

A questionnaire on the clinical use of electrocochleography (ECochG) was distributed to clinics throughout the world which use this method. The 26 replies comprised 3696 cases with a median age of 22.5 years. The majority (57.1%) were tested with a transtympanic promontory electrode. The risk of any undesirable effect from this electrode placement was negligible (less than 0.1%), but a greater probability (less than 1.0%) of serious complication from general anesthetics was revealed. On the benefit side, ECochG added significant information to the diagnoses of 87.8% of the children and 34.2% of the adults, and in 48.2% of the children and 2.0% of the adults this information was a primary factor in the hearing evaluation and decision on management. The cases for which ECochG was most helpful were predominantly children and neonates with complex neurological or psychiatric problems which interfered with reliable testing by other methods. Comparisons of ECochG with other methods were reported in 63.2% of the cases. The respondents judged 97.4% of those comparisons to reflect favorably on the validity of ECochG.