[The clinical picture and specific microbiological features of acute otitis media].

The objective of the present work was to study the spectrum of bacterial pathogenic agents responsible for the development of acute otitis media under present conditions and to elucidate the relationship between the pathogen species and the clinical course of the inflammatory process in the middle ear. A total of 60 patients of either sex at the age varying from 18 to 64 patients were available for the examination. All of them complained of ear pain, purulent discharge from the ears, hearing impairment, and general weakness. The following methods were employed: the analysis of the patients' complaints and their medical histories, visualexamination of the ENT organs, tonal threshold audiometry, tympanometry, and the analysis of secretion from the tympanic cavity using the real-time PCR technique. The study has demonstrated some regular patterns of the clinical manifestations of the disease depending on its causative agent. Specifically, it turned out that acute otitis media associated with the infection by Streptоcoccus pneumoniae is characterized by the more reactive clinical symptoms and the greater amount of complications compared with acute otitis media caused by Haemophilus influenzae that is largely a subclinical pathology. However, the latter condition more frequently leads to chronization of the pathological process.