Eligibility criteria
Inclusion criteria for our meta-analysis were as follows: (1) journal
articles published in English;
(2) articles concerned with TM perforation especially due to COM; (3)
studies describing myringoplasty or type I tympanoplasty, and comparing
surgical outcomes of the endoscope with the microscope; (4) either
temporalis fascia or perichondrium as a source of the graft tissue; (5)
graft placement method via underlay technique.
Exclusion criteria for our meta-analysis were as follows: (1) articles
describing other types of otitis media (e.g. acute OM or OM with
effusion) or other pathologies (e.g. cholesteatoma or middle ear
tumours); (2) the aid of an endoscope holder; (3) cadaver studies; (4)
animal studies; (5) irrelevant publications to our study.