Is reuse of autologous ear ossicles in cholesteatoma or chronic suppurative otitis media justified?
From the 1950s onwards ossicular bone autografts have been used to restore the middle ear sound conduction mechanism. Controversy still exists regarding the appropriateness of autologous ossicular bone grafts in chronic middle ear diseases. This communication is based on a study of 149 ossicles surgically removed from 120 patients with different ear diseases, at the Department of Otolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery of the University of Wuerzburg. It is the object of this study to systematically investigate the histological findings in the ossicles in cholesteatoma and chronic suppurative otitis media, and also to try to assess their significance. For comparison the ossicles of traumatic subluxation and otosclerosis are also included in our material. In about one-fourth of the incidences of cholesteatoma, squamous epithelium is found adherent to the ossicles with subepithelial connective tissue of varying thickness separating the matrix from the involved ossicle so that the matrix is
