[The anatomic study of tragal cartilage and its clinical application in ear surgery]

Dissecting adult cadaver's tragal cartilage and researching its clinical application in ear surgery.

Dissect the bilateral tragal cartilage of 22 adult cadavers immersed in formalin (both of male and female are 11). Measure and compute the average value of the length, width, thickness and area. Summarize autologous tragal cartilage's clinical application in ear surgery.

The statistic values of male tragal cartilage were: length (22.55 ± 0.89) mm, width (19.00 ± 1.09) mm, thickness (1.04 ± 0.09) mm, and area (315.70 ± 32.57) mm2. The statistic values of female respectively were (19.36 ± 0.86) mm, (15.73 ± 0.69) mm, (0.93 ± 0.06) mm, and (229.64 ± 13.97) mm2. Tragal cartilages were utilized in 419 middle ear surgeries in my department, including tympanoplasty(type I 189 cases, type II and III 116 cases), atticotomy (65 cases), and the repair of the lateral skull base (3 cases). The postoperative effect was satisfactory.

Tragal cartilage is in the operation region, which is convenient to be harvested and shaped. Hence, the donor can satisfy the requirement of general ear surgery and it is suitable for widely application in ear surgery.