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Prevention better than cure?

This systematic review looks at methods of ‘barrier protection’ or ‘barrier-enforcing’ to minimise allergic rhinitis symptoms, using 15 RCTs. Whilst the authors admit that patient numbers were small in a number of these studies, generally it seems that barrier techniques...

Bad splits

This is a meta-analysis of reported risk factors of a ‘bad split’ in a sagittal split mandibular osteotomy. They identified 30 observational articles and therefore acknowledged it is based on low quality studies. It is compounded by the definition of...

Laryngeal Physiology for the Surgeon and Clinician – Second Edition

This second edition is a short (110 pages), succinct and concise book. I don’t usually like reading physiology textbooks, but I found this one very interesting. It is written in a manner which is easy to read and digest. It’s...

Foundations of Aural Rehabilitation: Children, Adults, and Their Family Members – Fifth Edition

Nancy Tye-Murray leaves no stone unturned in her fifth edition of Foundations of Aural Rehabilitation: Children, Adults and Their Family Members. The exhaustive but not exhausting content offers a three-dimensional insight into the process of (re)habilitation in the clinical setting...

Fungal rhinosinusitis

Allergic fungal rhinosinusitis (AFRS) has been defined by the following characteristics: presence of nasal discharge, nasal obstruction, decreased sense of smell or facial pressure for 12 weeks, mucin within the sinus cavity containing fungal hyphae and degranulating eosinophils, endoscopic evidence...

Vascularised tissue in salvage total laryngectomy

Chemoradiation (CRT) has become the mainstay for locally advanced laryngeal cancer since the RTOG 91-11 trial. Unfortunately there is still a substantial demand for salvage laryngectomies, which have a higher complication rate, the most notable being pharyngocutaneous fistula (PCF). Several...

Treatment options for vestibular neuritis: systematic review and meta-analysis

Vestibular neuritis (VN) is the third most common cause of peripheral vertigo. VN has been postulated to have viral aetiology and historically it was treated with steroids, until 2011 when a Cochrane review demonstrated lack of robust evidence behind this...

Training people with Parkinson’s disease and their partners to have better conversations

Parkinson’s disease is predominantly considered a motor disorder, impacting speech, particularly voice volume, amongst other physical functions. Language and cognitive difficulties, such as difficulties in word finding and social pragmatics are also a key feature of Parkinson’s disease. Given the...

Balloon Eustachian tuboplasty – is it time to start doing it in children?

Given the potential applications for balloon Eustachian tuboplasty (BET) in children, its uptake in most centres has been slow. The reasons for this are multifactorial. There are technical issues – the feasibility of obtaining the correct size balloon and manoeuvring...

Immunosuppresants and ototoxicity

There is a wide range of immunosuppressant drugs ranging from calcineurin inhibitors (e.g. cyclosporine), anti-folic agents (e.g. methotrexate) to anti-TNF and monoclonal antibodies, many of which could be ototoxic. The authors performed a systematic review assessing ototoxicity secondary to immunosuppressant...

Is there an association with cognitive impairment and hearing loss in a developing country?

Hearing loss (HL) is the third leading chronic health condition among older adults. Most studies investigating HL and cognition have been performed in high-income countries. Risk factors for dementia (eg. hypertension, midlife hearing loss, obesity and physical inactivity) are more...