A Study of Use of Autologous Cartilage in Ossicular Reconstruction

Ossiculoplasty is one of the commonly done and challenging surgery in otology and has been done using various graft materials. Materials such as autologous cartilage (tragal or conchal) or allograft (homograft) of the same tissue and synthetic materials like polyethylene TORP, ceramic and hydroxyapatite PORP or Titanium prosthesis have been used. But the latter synthetic materials are expensive and have high extrusion rates. Autologous cartilage grafts are selected for Ossiculoplasty as they are easy to harvest at the same site of operation, non-toxic, has less extrusion rate, minimum shrinkage and lateralization. The aim of this study is to know the efficacy of cartilage in ossicular reconstruction and to evaluate hearing outcome. It is a prospective study done on patients attending ENT outpatient department at hospitals attached to J.J.M Medical College, Davanagere. 50 patients were included in the study who underwent ossicular reconstruction either with canal wall up or down mastoidectomy with tympanoplasty. Pre-operative mean ABG was 39.3 db whereas 6 months post-operative mean ABG was 31.6 db with mean ABG improvement of 7.7 db which was statistically significant. Hearing improvement is better in cases where stapes suprastructure was present and also in canal wall up mastoidectomy procedures. This study suggests that cartilage graft (tragal and conchal) is effective in cases of ossicular reconstruction in patients of chronic otitis media and gives good hearing gain. It is also a economical option in developing countries.