Three-dimensional CT-imaging of the ossicular chain.

In eight patients, with a known air-conduction hearing loss, three-dimensional images of the ossicular chain were constructed based on heavily overlapping high resolution CT-slices, obtained from a spiral CT data set. High quality three-dimensional images could be obtained in all eight patients. Supplementary information was derived from these three-dimensional images in three patients; in one, this supplementary information had therapeutic importance. The slight image quality loss in spiral-CT of the temporal bone, compared with conventional CT, is in some cases largely compensated by the possibility of rendering high quality secondary reconstructions.