Correlation of postoperative ear canal volumes with obliteration material and with volume of operation cavity.

In this study the preoperative and early and late postoperative volumes of ear canals of 131 operated chronic ears were measured by filling the ear canals with saline solution. The ears were operated on using the Palva method of obliteration of the operative cavity and reconstruction of the ear canal after removing the posterior, bony canal wall at operation. The average preoperative ear canal volume (V0) was 0.8 ml, the early postoperative volume (V1) was 1.0 ml, and the late postoperative volume (V2) was 1.2 ml. There was significantly more widening of the volume of the ear canals in the ears with a larger (greater than 7 ml) operation cavity as compared to ears with smaller (3-7 ml) operation cavity (p less than 0.05). Widening of the ear canals was smaller in the 12 ears with obliteration of the surgical cavity with musculoperiosteal flap and anorganic bone (Ossar) as compared to the 119 ears obliterated with musculoperiosteal flap only, but the difference was not statistically significant (p greater than 0.05).