A five-year-old boy was referred to the Ryukyu University Hospital with the chief complaint of bilateral deafness after a mumps imfection. In spite of steroid treatment, his hearing disturbance did not improve at all. He was therefore fitted with bilateral hearing aides, but it provided insufficient assistance. After a few months, his pronunciation gradually worsened and he became restless in his daily life. Therefore, he underwent cochlea implantation therapy in his right ear. Thereafter, his hearing ability became satisfactory, and his speech discrimination reached 85% of a normal level using only cochlea implant. His pronunciation and behavior also recovered to the levels demonstrated before suffering mumps labyrinthitis and he is now successfully attending a local elementary school.

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We herein report a case of tracheopathia osteochondroplastica, in which lesions were observed to extend from the larynx, especially the subglottis, to the trachea. In such a case, it is effective to evaluate bony tissues inside the subglottis and the trachea from a tracheostomy, in order to remove any stenotic lesions during laryngomicro- surgery, and to also maintain the inside space of the subglottis and trachea by means of a T-tube.

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We assessed the therapeutic effect of garenoxacin (GRNX) on various infectious diseases in the ear, nose and throat. GRNX was administered to a total of 62 patients with an acute infection for several days. The effective rates of GRNX treatment in ear infection, acute parasinusitis, acute infection of the throat and acute tonsillitis was 83.3%, 100%, 87.6% and 100%, respectively. In addition, GRNX treatment which was administered within five days after disease onset was more effective than that administered more than six days after onset (p < 0.05). These results suggest that GRNX therapy during the short term may therefore be very useful for the treatment of acute otorhinolaryngological infectious diseases.

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We herein report the case of a 60-year-old male who suffered from a saccular cyst of the larynx, which developed after he had undergone microsurgery of the larynx. A fiber-optic examination showed a bulge in the vestibular fold which hid the left vocal cord. Computed tomography demonstrated a high density area in the supraglottic area. We dissected the cyst under the laryngeal microsurgery using a KTP laser. We finally diagnosed it to be a saccular cyst based on both the histopathological and clinical findings. It highly suspected that the previous operation may have caused the development of the cyst. When undergoing laser surgery in the area of the laryngeal ventricle, we should therefore remove the vestibular fold as widely as possible so that the laryngeal ventricle can open widely.

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We experienced a dysphagic male case in which the dysphagia was considered to be due to both glottic and supraglottic closure. The symptoms improved using not only type I thyroplasty but also a modified thyrohyoidpexy. He had been treated for recurrent maxillary carcinoma and thus began to suffer from aphonia and severe dysphagia nine years after the first therapy. ENT fiberscopy and MRI examinations revealed paralysis of IX, X, and XII cranial nerves and a mass lesion of the parapharyngeal space, respectively, which was diagnosed to be lymphatic metastasis of the maxillary carcinoma and the patient was subsequently treated with cyber-knife therapy. Pre-operative video-endoscopy (VE) showed an impaired closure of both the glottic and supraglottic levels, however, the symptoms improved after performing a manual laryngeal elevation maneuver. A pre-operative video-fluorogram (VF) revealed severe aspiration before performing the laryngeal elevation. Under local anesthesia, thyroplasty was thus performed in the normal manner, however, the approximation of the thyroid cartilage to the hyoid bone was done toward the anterior-superior direction. Post-operative VE and VF revealed an immediate improvement in the closures of both laryngeal levels, in addition to an apparent reduction in the amount of aspiration, respectively.

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We treated five cases presenting with tracheal stenosis by means of staged operations. The etiologies of tracheal stenosis in these cases were long-term tracheal intubation in 3 cases, Wegener's granulomatosis in 1 and idiopathic in 1. For all cases, the trough method was employed for surgery. The scar tissue inside the trachea was therefore eradicated. The raw suface was covered with a free mucocal graft and it was fixed with a stent. After confirming the reepithelization of the inside of the trachea and ensuring that it was free from restenosis, then the tracheostoma was thereafter closed in stages. Consequently, the trachostoma was successfully closed in 4 out of 5 cases. The prevention of granulation formation and local infection was thus considered to play an important role in the performance of successful surgical treatment.

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