Symposium on ear diseases. III. The older cleft palate patient. (A Clinical Otologic‐Audiologic Study.)

Abstract

Abstract A clinical study of 100 randomly selected cleft lip and/or palate adult patients, ages 14 to 77 years. Forty‐nine out of 100 were otologically normal. Forty‐two out of 100 were audiologically normal. A negative history of past ear disease is not an accurate screening method for abnormality. Auditory impairments (27 out of 58) suggesting a sensori‐neural loss were found in relatively young adults. Is there a progressive degenerative sensori‐neural hearing impairment in congenital cleft disease? Thirty‐one out of 58 had conductive losses: these were correlated with the otologic findings on examination. Twenty‐three out of 100 had had palatal pharyn‐goplasty. The surgical procedure to reduce hypernasality probably does not aggravate the Eustachian tubal dysfunction. Approximately 50 percent of the congenital cleft lip and/or palate adults continue to have ear problems, probably for their lifetime.