PRELIMINARY GUIDELINES FOR REPORTING TREATMENT RESULTS IN MENIERES-DISEASE CONDUCTED BY THE COMMITTEE OF THE JAPANESE-SOCIETY-FOR-EQUILIBRIUM-RESEARCH, 1993

In order to draft guidelines for reporting treatment results in Menier e's disease (MD) in Japan, 17 committee members elected from the Japan ese Society for Equilibrium Research (JSER) have met for about two yea rs. The preliminary guidelines obtained from their discussions are sum marized as follows. i) Evaluations of symptoms: Only definitive vertig inous spells with spontaneous nystagmus should be evaluated (AAOO, 197 2). The parameter for the assessment of hearing levels should be evalu ated using four-frequency pure-tone averages (PTA) at 250 Hz, 500 Hz, 1 kHz and 2 kHz. ii) Evaluation period: Valid results for the evaluati on should be based on observations at least six months before treatmen t and over at least 12 months after initiation of therapy. iii) Evalua tion criteria The formula expressing the effects of treatment on verti ginous spells should adopt a numeric vertigo score, which is shown in the AAO-HNS (1985) guidelines. If the duration of pre-treatment evalua tion period is less than 6 months, the divisor is replaced by the aver age of definitive spells per month for the period of observation. iv) Global judgment: For a global judgment, patients and doctors should jo intly evaluate the treatment results from the standpoints of their sub jective and objective symptoms respectively.