Hearing Restoration
Children with hearing loss are at risk for speech and language delay. Hearing restoration surgery can be performed successfully in certain cases of microtia. In these select cases the hearing restoration can be done when the child is six years old.
Six months after the cosmetic ear reconstruction is completed the child is ready for the hearing restoration phase. Dr. Romo advocates a system that is surgically implanted and allows sound to be conducted through the bone rather than through the middle ear.
This two-staged procedure allows for excellent conductive hearing restoration and it has a low complication rate. In other procedures, there are potential risks of major complications, i.e. facial nerve paralysis; cholesteatoma formation (if there is negative pressure in the middle ear it can pull part of the eardrum the wrong way creating a cyst that can become infected); ear canal stenosis (collection of wax and debris in the canal); and chronic mastoiditis (inflamation of the mastoid, the rounded protrusion of bone just behind the ear).