Save the hearing, an ear surgery training project program to combat deafness in developing countries

Hearing loss is one of the most common health problems affecting people in the developing countries so our aim of the “Save The Hearing Project” was to combat deafness by training local doctors for ear surgery in order to treat their local patients with low cost as possible. The project was done as ear surgery campaigns in peripheral areas in Egypt, Yemen, and other countries, to train young ENT specialists and to treat patients there. Our plan was put according to the frequency of different causes of deafness as shown by previous surveys. We used the previous local and evidence-based researches to make our protocols of management of different diseases. These protocols were further evaluated during our work. The project has five stages. The first stage included management of sudden sensory neural hearing loss (SSNHL), otitis media with effusion (OME), and local anesthesia for the ear surgery—cartilage tympanoplasty and ossiculoplasty. The second stage included mastoidectomy cholesteatoma surgery and otoendoscopy. The third stage included more advanced surgery as stapedectomy and tympanosclerosis. The fourth stage included combating SNHL mainly through audiology and rehabilitation program, beside referral for cochlear implants to specialized centers. The fifth stage was only a plan for doing stem cell research in management of hearing loss. Our teams did about 42 campaigns only and the data of 31 were recorded. There were 259 attendants, 70 had hands on training, and 35 were well trained and became trainers. We did 270 tympanoplasties, 52 mastoidectomies, and cholesteatoma surgery beside 16 operations of stage III. Training an ear surgeon is a tedious and long process, but it is at the end very fruitful and useful for the community. Most causes of HL are preventable. We think that our project plan to combat HL is very suitable to be applied in developing countries in Africa and the Middle East.