Shift of the distribution of age in patients with otosclerosis

Morphological and biochemical investigations have shown evidence of an asso ciation between measles virus and otosclerosis. Epidemiological analysis of age and gender distributions in the 1960s and I970s revealed a higher inci dence of otosclerosis in women, the average age of onset of clinical distur bances and need for surgery being between 15 and 40 years. In the late 1960 s and early I970s a campaign to vaccinate children against measles was star ted in Germany. The aim of our study was to evaluate whether this campaign has had any influence on the distributions of the age and gender of patient s affected by otosclerosis over the past 20 years. The study included patie nts suffering from clinical otosclerosis who had undergone stapedectomy bet ween 1978 and 1999 and whose clinical data were complete (n = 1351). Statis tical analysis during the recruitment period indicated a significant increa se in the average age of the otosclerosis patients (p = 0.012). With regard to the gender distribution it was found that the increase of otosclerosis in women compared to men was statistically insignificant (p = 0.418). These data strongly support the hypothesis of a measles virus involvement in oto sclerosis and may reflect a decreased incidence of otosclerosis in the gene ration of patients vaccinated against measles virus.