Diagnostic Modalities Used for Fungal Isolates Confirmed in Clinically Suspected Cases of Otomycosis: A Screening Study

Abstract

Otomycosis is one of the most attending ailed in ENT practice. Fungal infection of external auditory canal is called otomycosis. Discomfort or pain, itching, ear blockage and ear discharge are symptoms of otomycosis. Ear discharge is seen in the cases of bacterial otitis externa (Furuncle or diffuse otitis externa), otomycosis, acute otitis media, chronic otitis media, etc. So to confirm diagnosis of otomycosis, microbiology test of ear discharge is needed. For this purpose present study was carried out. Total 65 ears of 61 patients who were clinically suspected to have otomycosis were included in this study. Ear discharges were collected from those ears by sterile cotton swab and were tested by 10% KOH preparation and fungal culture to rule out fungal pathogen. Among them, 40 samples were found to be positive and most isolated pathogen was Mycelia sterilia (57.7%). On the basis of this result, Mycelia sterilia is the most common fungal pathogen in study area (i.e., Jamnagar).