Objective: To evaluate the use of porcine small intestinal submucosal grafts for tympanic membrane repair.
Patients: Adult and pediatric patients with tympanic membrane perforations with and without chronic otitits media, and perforations after removal of cholesteatoma.
Intervention: Endoscopic or microscopic tympanic membrane repair using porcine small intestinal submucosal grafts (Biodesign).
Main outcome measure(s): Perforation closure, bone and air pure-tone averages (PTA), air-bone gap (ABG), and word recognition scores (WRS) were recorded as outcome measures.
Results: Thirty-seven patients were included with a mean age of 25.4 years (range, 6-75), 57% men. Twenty-six cases (70%) were performed endoscopically and 34 (92%) had concomitant cartilage grafting. Three patients (8%) had postoperative pinpoint (<1% surface area) perforation, and two patients (5%) had postoperative perforation, with an overall success rate of 86.5%. The mean improvement in air-bone gap was 7.6 dB and (p = 0.006). There were no statistically significant differences in closure rates when comparing primary versus revision cases, endoscopic versus microscopic cases, size of perforation, cholesteatoma, concomitant mastoidectomy, age, tobacco exposure, or comorbid diabetes mellitus. Patients with concomitant cartilage graft were more likely to be successful when compared with those without cartilage graft (p = 0.04).
Conclusions: Porcine small intestinal submucosal grafts are effective in the repair of the tympanic membrane. These grafts are an excellent choice in total endoscopic cases as it avoids incisions necessary for allograft harvest.