Early Stages of Otosclerosis

Some of the cases to be presented are early in every respect: length of time since the process began, size of the area affected, histologic appearance of the tissue and recognizable clinical symptoms. In fact, with reference to the last point, all are exceedingly early. Otosclerosis was not recognized in any of the patients whose hearing was examined, and it is doubtful if more than two of these histologically proved cases could have been diagnosed as otosclerosis by any clinical methods now known. But, as will be seen later, from the point of view of histologic structure of the area and probable length of time since the pathologic process first began, some of the cases are far from "early" ones. The several cases will be described individually, and the points of especial interest indicated in the discussion of each. All of the patients were at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. REPORT