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Growing up smelling the roses

How often do we ask about sense of smell in children? Undoubtedly, the olfactory function is seldom formally assessed in the paediatric population, although evidence exists to suggest its potential links with handicap in children’s learning and development. This large...

Smoking causes cancer – so what’s new?

You may well ask what is the novel value of a paper looking at smoking habits in patients with confirmed head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC), but this paper highlights some pertinent points for clinical practice in the current...

Marshmallows for swallowing assessments!

The complaint of ‘food sticking in my throat’ is one many of us will have heard several times in clinical practice. The authors of this study report the prevalence of this symptom to be between 5-8% in the general population...

OTO-104 in noise-induced and cisplatin-induced hearing loss

These two animal studies report on potential new applications for intra-tympanic OTO-104, a slow-release hydrogel formulation of dexamethasone that is currently being used in a Europe-wide randomised trial for Ménière’s disease. In the first paper, guinea pigs were given a...

Posturography in persistent postural-perceptual dizziness (PPPD)

Those in neuro-otology practice will be familiar with PPPD now appearing in the forthcoming beta edition of ICD-11. This condition combines the symptoms of phobic postural vertigo and chronic subjective dizziness in which anxiety plays a part. The underlying hypothesis...

Alcohol consumption and the risk of developing benign laryngeal disorders?

Alcohol consumption among South Korean adults is apparently high, with over three quarters of the adult population consuming alcohol and a ‘high-risk’ drinking rate of one in five. Excessive alcohol consumption is considered to be a risk factor for developing...

Vascular disease and sudden sensorineural hearing loss

Oussoren et al performed a systematic review and meta-analyses of current literature on the above topic: specifically, cardiovascular risk factors for developing idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss (iSSNHL), the presence of white matter hyperintensities in patients with iSSNHL and the...

A raised neutrophil / lymphocyte ratio predicts vestibular schwannoma growth

It has long been known that the neutrophil to lymphocyte count ratio (NLR) is a marker of inflammation and that a higher ratio relates to poorer outcomes in some malignant tumours including some head and neck cancers. Neutrophilia (and therefore...

Patient reported outcomes improve if antibiotic choice is directed from endoscopic culture results in chronic rhinosinusitis

The use of antibiotics in chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) has been established as part of the EPOS guidelines, as has the role of taking swabs for microbiology culture. There has not been much literature however on whether tailoring antibiotics in response...

Postop follow up of oral squamous cell carcinoma: a new protocol

Oral and oropharyngeal cancers together are the sixth most common malignancy in the world, with an increasing incidence of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). The recurrence rate of OSCC is reported to be approximately 10-26%. About two-thirds of all recurrent...