Are long-term auditory results following ossiculoplasty with bone cement as successful as early-middle period results?

Purpose: Bone-cement (BC) ossiculoplasty is one of the options to solve ossicular chain problems. Many authors reported successful results in the early or mid-follow-up period; however, there is no long-term result in the literature. We aim to evaluate long term results of BC ossiculoplasty.

Materials And Methods: Forty-eight patients who underwent BC ossiculoplasty as incudostapedial re-bridging by the same surgeon were invited to evaluation. Postoperative otomicroscopic examination was performed. Pre-operative and post-operative audiological results after longer follow up and graft success rate were noted.

Results: Fourteen patients came for control examination. The follow-up period was between 87 and 135 months (mean 102 months). None of the patients had graft failure. Ten patients had early postoperative follow-up results (between 10 and 52; mean 24 months). In the comparison of preoperative and early postoperative air-bone gap, there were significant differences in all frequencies while the comparison of preoperative and long-term postoperative results showed a significant difference only in 250 and 500 Hz. Early postoperative results were better than late with significant difference only in the 2000 and 4000 Hz.

Conclusions: As reported by many studies, bone cement application provides a significant auditory improvement in the early postoperative period. The results of the present study showed that this early auditory success may decrease over time with a long-term follow-up. Further studies should be conducted with larger patient groups to clarify the long-term benefits of this treatment and possible causes for its deterioration.