Ménière’s Disease with Bilateral Fluctuant Hearing Loss

Abstract

Although bilateral involvement of Ménière’s disease can produce deafness in both ears, actually little attention had been directed to this involvement. In 1959, Jongkees[1] reported the high incidence involving the second ear in order to warn of a dangerous trend toward using destructive procedures in the treatment of this disease at that time. Since then, several reports concerning the bilateral aspects of this disease have appeared [2–8]. However, the lack of mutually agreeable diagnostic criteria for making these reports and the differences in Ménière’s disease characteristics of patients among institutes makes it difficult to establish definitive interpretations. In 1988, the Vestibular Disorder Research Committee made a survey among 15 committee member institutes using the same diagnostic criteria of bilateral involvement of Ménière’s disease. Based on the results obtained, the incidence and characteristics of bilateral involvement in Ménière’s disease will be discussed in this chapter.