Hearing preservation surgery for acoustic neuroma patients has recently been performed in many institutes. There are controversies on the indication for hearing preservation surgery because several problems such as the long term prognosis of hearing, the quality of preserved hearing and the preoperative status affecting the hearing preservation rate have not been solved.
In this study, we analyzed the surgical results in 95 acoustic neuroma patients who underwent hearing preservation surgery. The results are as follows:
1) The useful hearing could be preserved after hearing preservation surgery, and the preserved hearing was not deteriorated for at least several years.
2) There was no statistically significant difference in preoperative SDS, IT5 of ABR and power level of otoacoustic emission between patients who preserved successful hearing and those who did not. From these results, these preoperative data are not useful to predict the possibility of hearing preservation.
3) In the present study, there was no patient whose hearing was improved after surgery. In order to preserve useful hearing, therefore, we have to select patients with good hearing for hearing preservation surgery.