Conductive Hearing Loss
Normal hearing depends upon transmission of sound through the ear canal, eardrum and the three bones (ossicles) located in the middle ear space: the malleus, incus and stapes. Due to problems such as chronic ear infections, cholesteatoma, congenital defects or even trauma, these ossicles can be damaged, scarred or absent. This results in a "conductive" or "mechanical" hearing loss.
Treatment Options
At the Ear and Hearing Center at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, surgical therapies have evolved which allow correction of some of these hearing losses by implantation of prosthetic -- or artificial -- ossicles, which are called partial or total ossicular reconstruction prostheses.
In addition, the Ear and Hearing Center offers state-of-the-art management for otosclerosis, a sometimes hereditary and sometimes congenital problem in which the stapes bone becomes abnormally fixed and fails to transmit sound to the inner ear. Using a surgical laser, the fixed stapes bone is removed and replaced by a stainless steel piston. Hearing is restored to normal or near normal levels in more than 90 percent of patients.
