The objective of this study is to determine the subjective and objective outcomes of tympanoplasty surgery carried out in patients with otitis media and to identify factors responsible for these outcomes. The study setting is tertiary care urban referral hospital in a developing economy and the study methodology is a prospective analysis of patients with diagnosis of chronic suppurative otitis media that had tympanoplasty with or without mastoidectomy between May 2005 and September 2009 at National Hospital Abuja. Subjects were evaluated for age, sex, size and site of perforation, status of operated ear(s) (dry/discharging), status of the contralateral ear, surgical technique, subjective and objective pre-operative and post-operative hearing scores, average post-operative follow-up time, and post-operative complications, and results were statistically analyzed. A total of 45 patients (51 ears) were operated. Age distribution was 8-52 years. Type 1 tympanoplasty was done in 41 patients and Type 3 in 4 patients. Seven of the patient had concomitant mastoid surgery (cortical mastoidectomy). 3/51 of the cases had discharging ears at surgery. 16/45 of the patients (19/51 ears) had cartilage graft tympanoplasty, while 29/45 (32 ears) had temporalis fascia tympanoplasty. 15/16 of the cartilage group as well as 26/29 of the fascia group reported subjective hearing improvement, whilst the actual graft take was 12/16 of the cartilage group and 23/29 of the fascia group. Objective hearing improvement was observed in all of the cartilage as well as 26/29 of the fascia group. This study confirms success of tympanoplasty among Nigerians, and recommends that subjective hearing assessment should form part of indicators for success following tympanoplasty.

The objective of this study was to assess the effectiveness of variable titration, low-dose intratympanic gentamycin (ITG) into the worse affected ear of patients with bilateral Meniere's disease (MD). It is a prospective analytic case series conducted in a tertiary care referral hospital in a developing economy and a tertiary care otologic private ENT clinic. Patients with MD who failed or are intolerant to medical treatment were recruited based on the criteria of definite MD and bilateral ear involvement. 0.75 cc of low-dose (40 mg/ml) buffered gentamycin was injected into the worse affected ear and patients followed up every 2 months, and the regime repeated only if subjective vertigo persists. The patient's age, sex, duration of MD symptom, ear first affected, ear selected for ITG, pure tone threshold at each visit, duration of caloric response (in seconds) for the injected ear, status of tinnitus in both ipsilateral (injected) and contralateral ears, total number of injections before last follow-up, and time since last follow-up are entered into the study protocol and analyzed. Nine patients with a mean age of 45 years and mean duration of symptoms of 59 months were treated. The mean total number of injections was 2.8 with a mean follow-up period of 34 months. Three cases showed drop in pure tone average threshold (2.5-7.5 dB) while an increase in threshold was noted in six cases (2.5-5 dB). All cases demonstrated decrease in duration of response to iced water caloric stimulation in ipsilateral ear, and 4/9 of contralateral ear. The variable titration method using low-dose intratympanic gentamycin directed at worse ear of adult Nigerians with bilateral Meniere's disease appears to be highly effective. More studies are needed.