Hearing impairment in chronic otitis media with cholesteatoma

This study involved a five-year review of 94 patients with chronic otitis media with cholesteatoma. In total, 110 surgical procedures were carried out. The study comprised 96 cases; surgery that was a revision of previous surgery were excluded. The extent of cholesteatoma and its associated bone destruction were observed and recorded. Of the 96 cases, 14.6% were classified as Grade I, 13.5% as Grade II, 31.3% as Grade III and 40.6% as Grade IV. This indicated that the majority of patients with chronic otitis media with cholesteatomas were in an advanced stage. Preoperative pure tone audiogram showed that 49% of these patients had pure conductive hearing impairment; 29.2% had a mixed type hearing impairment; 15.6% had a sensorineural hearing impairment and only 6.2% had normal hearing. In 78% of these cases, the conductive component of hearing loss was improved with surgery. If 40 db was used as a standard for the social hearing level, 72.9% of these cases were handicapped.