Results
During the study period, 100 patients were included, out of which 6 and 4 patients had lost to follow up in MT and ET group, and thus, only 90 patients were assessed. The demographic profile including age, sex, site of perforation, graft uptake rate and follow up range has been shown in table 1. In the MT group, the mean age of patients was 30.89 ± 11.78, and the age ranged from 18 to 60 years old, and in the ET group, the mean age of the patients was 30.43±10.18 ranged from 18 to 57. There was no statistical difference between the two age groups (p-0.285).
There were 20 males and 24 females in the MT group and 27 males and 19 females in the ET group which was not statistically different (p-0.291).
Based on the laterality of disease, in the MT group, 19 cases were on the right side and 25 on the left side. In the ET group, 26 cases were on the right side, and 20 on the left side. Both were statistically insignificant (p-0.292).
The graft success rate at a minimum of 12 months post-operative period in the MT group was 81.8% with follow up range of 16.09± 5.071 months and in ET was 91.3% with a followup of 14.67±4.02 months. Three cases in MT and one case in ET which had initial graft uptake seen at 6 months later failed during follow up of 12 months period. There seem to be improved graft uptake percentage seen in ET then MT however, the data was not statistically significant between the two groups. (p-0.225).
Mean surgical duration was defined as the time of margin freshening up to the time where the ear pack was kept. The mean operative time for MT and ET was 68.68±18.79 minutes and 61.24 ± 11.18 minutes respectively. The difference obtained was statistically significant (p-0.003). Endoscopic tympanoplasty significantly saved time than the microscopic tympanoplasty.
Hearing outcomes were as shown in table 2. There was a highly statistically significant hearing outcome within the group before and after the surgery in both groups, endoscopic and microscopic. But there was no change in hearing outcomes between the two groups. Thus, the hearing outcome didn’t change with either use of an endoscope or a microscope.