The World Hearing Center of the Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing is a well-known place on the global map of oto-rhino-laryngology surgery training courses, especially for people who want to study the advanced hearing implant surgical techniques. International training courses specialized in the round window surgery – the WAW Window Approach Workshops – for nearly ten years have been attracting surgeons from the whole world, both from centers starting their cochlear implant programs and from experienced centers aiming to improve their qualifications learning from the best teachers.
WAW workshops are addressed to ear surgeons who want to learn the newest surgical techniques, indications and applications of hearing implants. A particular attraction of these courses is the opportunity of studying the method of partial deafness treatment with implants under the direction of Prof. H. Skarżyński, the pioneer and creator of the Partial Deafness Treatment PDT program.
The workshop on 7-8 November was the 25th edition of this extraordinary course. It was also the sixth workshop organized within the framework of the international training series CI Surgical Foundation Course organized in collaboration with the Cochlear Academy.
The scientific program included the lectures presented by invited lecturers and experts from the Institute as well as the practical training comprising demonstration surgeries and hands-on training in the laboratory.
The lectures were on the topics related to diagnostics and qualification of patients for implantation, advanced surgical techniques and newest hearing implant technologies. The invited lecturers were Prof. Thomas Klenzner from the Heinrich Heine University in Dusseldorf, Prof. Laszlo Rovo from the University of Szeged, who had participated in the earlier editions of these workshops and Prof. Janez Rebol from the University of Maribor in Slovenia, who was visiting the World Hearing Center for the first time.
The WAW workshops place a high value on a practical training, with particular attention to the newest, minimally invasive surgical techniques allowing preserving intact the anatomical structures of the inner ear and preoperative hearing threshold in the cases of partial deafness. Particularly interesting and valuable for the participants are the demonstration hearing implant surgeries performed by Prof. H. Skarżyński with the team of the Otorhinolaryngology Surgery Clinic. The participants can subsequently train these surgical techniques on their own, with the help of experienced instructors in the laboratory. Re-creating surgical manoeuvers performed earlier by the experienced operators they apprehend the importance of practical experience for a surgeon.
There were 24 surgeons participating in the XXV WAW Window Approach Workshop, representing different countries and cochlear implant centers from Kosovo, Portugal, Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary, United Kingdom, Romania, Austria, Slovenia, Israel and Belgium.