The purpose of ear surgery is to repair the hole in the eardrum, repair the ear ossicles, clear the infections in the middle ear cavity and return the hearing to normal. While sometimes all of these goals can be achieved, in some ear infections, the sole purpose may be to save the patient’s life. Classically, ear surgeries are performed with a microscope. For this, the hair around the patient’s ears is usually shaved. An incision is made on the skin behind the auricle and the middle ear cavity is reached from here. However, in order to reach the middle ear cavity, the ear bone, which is healthy for many times, must be pierced with special tools and a path must be opened. After the surgery, bandage and dressing should be applied to the patient’s ear area. All these create setbacks in terms of patient comfort.

In recent years, a group of which I am a member all over the world is now performing ear surgeries endoscopically. No incision is made on the skin in this way. The image is transferred to a large monitor by entering the external ear canal with imaging tools called endoscopes and the surgery is performed under this vision.

The most valuable advantages of endoscopic ear surgery are:

The operation can be performed entirely through the external ear canal, without making any skin incisions.
With angled endoscopes, areas that cannot be seen and reached with a microscope can be easily seen.
While removing diseased tissues, healthy tissues are largely preserved.
Since the operation is performed with a larger magnification compared to the microscope, a much more sensitive surgery is performed.
The tissue damage that occurs during the surgery is much less than the surgery performed with a microscope. This ensures that the post-operative recovery is much faster.
There is no need for bandage and dressing application after the surgery. Patients return to their daily lives much faster.

Endoscopic ear surgeries are:

Repair of eardrum perforations
Inserting an ear tube
Otosclerosis (calcification of the ossicles) surgeries
Surgery for chronic middle ear infections
In addition, in many surgeries, endoscopes are used in combination with a microscope, allowing the surgery to be performed more healthily in cases where the microscopes are insufficient.