How Does Ear Inflammation Occur?

Ear inflammation occurs when bacteria settle in the inside, outer or middle ear and multiply to the point of causing disease. Microbes to the ear usually come from the nasal passage and throat. The Eustachian tube in children is flatter and shorter. For this reason, especially middle ear inflammation is more common in children. As long as the eardrum is intact, bacteria that will cause infection cannot enter the middle ear from the outer ear. Sometimes an infection can be seen in the middle ear that is not due to bacteria.

This condition usually occurs as a result of the blockage of the Eustachian tube due to allergies or nasal flesh. This condition, called serous middle ear inflammation, has different symptoms than otitis media due to bacteria. Therefore, the treatment is also different. Inflammation due to bacteria usually resolves with medication. However, serous middle ear inflammation may sometimes require an operation such as scratching the eardrum or inserting a tube.

Symptoms

The most common symptom of ear infections is pain. Especially in children, the feeling of pain is more. Apart from this, symptoms such as hearing impairment, fever, restlessness in babies, and fullness are common. In a situation such as inflammation piercing the eardrum, bloody or inflammatory discharge occurs. In serous otitis media, there is no pain, but hearing impairment is observed. In chronic middle ear inflammation, there are complaints in the form of hearing impairment, and intermittent or continuous discharge.

How is Ear Inflammation Treated?

Acute otitis media can usually be relieved by administering antibiotics and pain medications. Rarely, there may be cases when there is no response to antibiotics. In these cases, it may be necessary to scratch the eardrum. In serous otitis media, antibiotic treatment is also applied first. Especially serious middle ear inflammations due to allergy can be eliminated with antibiotic treatment. However, many times the surgical operation is needed in the form of scratching the eardrum or inserting a tube.

The treatment of chronic middle ear infections is a surgical operation.

What happens if I don’t have surgery?

In cases where surgical treatment is not performed or delayed in serous middle ear inflammations, the collapse and fluid accumulation in the membrane increase. Hearing loss becomes difficult in daily life. In such a case, the chance of success of the surgery to be performed later is considerably reduced. In chronic middle ear inflammations, if the hearing loss is low and the inflammation is passive and does not discharge frequently, surgery may not be needed.

In this case, the patient should take care not to leak water into his ear. However, as much as possible, the upper respiratory tract should try not to have an infection. But if the inflammation becomes active frequently and there is discharge, hearing loss progresses and melting in the ear ossicles increases. The solution to this problem is definitely surgery.

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