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Accurate diagnosis of acute otitis media (AOM) or otitis media with effusion depends on the presence of middle ear effusion (MEE). Tympanometry and spectral gradient acoustic reflectometry (SGAR) are noninvasive methods for detecting MEE. To compare the accuracy of the two methods, researchers analyzed data from an AOM vaccine study in which 786 healthy children (age range, 6–24 months) underwent 2854 tympanograms and 3096 SGAR assessments during a 2-year period. All children also underwent tympanic membrane examinations by validated otoscopists, which served as the gold standard for determining the presence of MEE.
The overall diagnostic accuracy of the two methods was slightly, but significantly, higher for tympanometry than for SGAR (area…