Dr. Roland Eavey has dedicated much of his career to focusing exclusively on the pediatric and adolescent ear. He provides care simultaneously for both Microtia as well as Aural Atresia, rather unique among microtia/atresia care givers. He is board certified both in otolaryngology and pediatrics, also unique among surgeons who provide care for microtia. Dr. Eavey first trained in aural atresia surgery in the 1970’s and in microtia surgery in the 1980’s while attending Harvard University. He has maintained a steady practice in microtia and aural atresia repair for hundreds of patients during these decades. He has made several improvements to both microtia as well as aural atresia reconstruction as well as spearheaded unique research efforts. Dr. Eavey has also presented at many microtia and atresia surgical conferences in hopes of educating patients about all options for microtia and aural atresia.
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Tissue Engineering
Tissue engineering is an idea that people might be able to grow their own body parts with a little bit of help from a laboratory. Tissue engineering first was seen in the media with the famous “mouse with the ear on its back” from the laboratory of Dr. Charles Vacanti. Dr. Vacanti is a Professor at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Eavey and his Research Fellows have worked closely with Dr. Vacanti over the years and both have demonstrated tissue engineering research for the public on such venues such as The BBC, The CBS News with Dan Rather, The Discovery Channel, and The Oprah Winfrey Show.
The technique to grow an ear follows the concept that by 1) taking a tiny piece of cartilage tissue, 2) dissolving away the white springy tissue to collect the actual cells inside (the cells are microscopic and trapped inside the white tissue called matrix), 3) expanding the number of cells by various methods in the lab, 3) placing that increased volume of cells on or in a structure that has a pre-designated shape of an ear, 4) implanting the new ear can be back onto the patient.
Obviously the research is more complicated than the above explanation and takes a long time to bring to real use for real patients.
Molecular Genetics
We seek to learn more about the cause of microtia. Although microtia often occurs with no known family members, at times ear anomalies occur in families, implying that perhaps some patients with microtia could have a genetic influence. In conjunction with Seidman Labs at Harvard Medical School, investigations are on-going to try to determine possible hereditary mechanisms that might or might not be involved. Our studies involve patients from many global locales and involve dedicated collaborators.
Selected Microtia Clinical Publications from 1989 – 2009
| Eavey R: Management Strategies for Congenital Ear Malformations. In: Pediatric Clinics of North America K. Grundfast, ed. WB Saunders Co., Philadelphia l989 |
| Eavey R: The Pediatric Ear: Advances in Care. Clinical Pediatrics 1:4, 1992. |
| Eavey R: Structural Reasons for Conductive Hearing Loss. In: Hearing Loss in Childhood: A Primer. R. Eavey and J. Klein, eds. Ross Publication, Columbus, OH, pp 45-52, l992. |
| Eavey R, Cheney M: Reconstruction of Congenital Auricular Malformation.Chapter 38 in Surgery of the Ear and Temporal Bone J. Nadol and H. Schuknecht, eds Raven Press, Ltd., New York, 1993 (Revised 2001) |
| Eavey RD: Surgical Repair of the Auricle for Microtia Chapter 2 in Atlas of Pediatric Otolaryngology Bluestone and S. Stool, eds., W.B. Saunders, Philadelphia, 1994 |
| Eavey R: Microtia and Significant Auricular Malformation Arch Otol Head Neck Surg 121:57-62, 1995 |
| Eavey R: Ear Malformations: What a Pediatrician Can Do to Assist with Auricular Reconstruction. Pediatric Clinics of North America, 43:1233-1244, 1996. |
| Eavey RD: Malformacão da orelha: como Orientar uma Reconstrucão Auricular. In: Manual de Ororrinolaringologia Pediátrica da IAPO, T. Sih, ed., San Paulo, 1997. |
| Eavey RD: Microtia Repair: Creation of a Functional Postauricular Sulcus. Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 120:789-93, 1999. |
| Eavey RD: Microtia. Chapter 22 In: Pediatric Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery L. Kaban and M. Troulis, eds. W B Saunders Co. Philadelphia, 2004 |
| Kamil SH, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: The Future of Microtia Surgery, In: Fourth IAPO Proceedings, T. Sih, ed. 2005 |
| Monroy A, Nicolau Y, Alizadeh, F, Eavey R: Microtia Repair; the case for surgical reconstruction. J Oral Maxillofac Surg 2006 Nov 64 (11) 1655-63. |
| Troulis M, Keogh I, Monroy A, Eavey R, Kaban L: Isolated microtia as a marker for unsuspected hemifacial microsomia Archives of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery 2007 Oct;133(10)997-1001 |
| Ghanem MA, Abreu DV, Quintanilla-Dieck Mde L, Eavey RD: Soft-tissue reconstruction for atypical microtia malformations and trauma Archives of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery 2008 Aug;134(8):879-83 |
Selected Microtia Research Publications from 1989 – 2009
| Rodriquez A, Cao YL, Ibarra C, Pap S, Vacanti M, Eavey RD, Vacanti C: Characteristics of Cartilage Engineered from Human Pediatric Auricular Cartilage. Plast Reconstr Surg 103:1111-1119, 1999. |
| Saim AB, Cao Y, Weng Y, Ruzymah I, Chang CN, Vacanti MA, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: Engineering Autogenous Cartilage in the Shape of a Helix using an Injectable Hydrogel Scaffold. Laryngoscope 110:1694-1697, 2000 |
| Arevalo, CA, Cao Y, Vacanti M, Weng Y, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: Influence of Growth Factors on Tissue-Engineered Pediatric Elastic Cartilage. Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 126:1234-1238, 2000 |
| Arevalo, CA, Cao Y, Vacanti M, Weng Y, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: Influence of Growth Factors on Tissue-Engineered Pediatric Elastic Cartilage. Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 126:1234-1238, 2000 |
| Arevalo CA, Cao Y, Weng Y, Vacanti M, Rodriquez A, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: The Effect of Fibroblast Growth Factor and Transforming Growth Factor-beta on Chondrocytes and Tissue-Engineered Autologous Cartilage. Tissue Eng 7:81-88, 2001 |
| Kamil SH, Amuniddin BS, Bonasser LJ, Arevalo-Silva CA, Weng Y, Woda M, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD, Vacanti MP. Tissue-engineered Human Auricular Cartilage Demonstrates Euploidy by Flow Cytometry. Tissue Eng 8:85-92, 2002. |
| Kamil SH, Kojima K, Vacanti MP, Bonassar LJ, Vacanti CA, Eavey, RD. In vitro Tissue Engineering to Generate a Human Sized Auricle and Nasal Tip. Laryngoscope 113:90-94, 2003 |
| Kamil SH, Woda M, Bonasser LJ, Novitsky YW, Vacanti CA, Vacanti MP, Eavey RD. Normal Diploid State Observed by Flow Cytometry in Human Auricular Chondrocytes after Repeated Passaging in vitro and after Generation of Tissue Engineered Cartilage in vivo: Patient Safety. Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2003 Oct;129(4)390-6. |
| Kamil SH, Rodriquez A, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD and Vacanti MP. Expansion of the Number of Human Auricular Chondrocytes: Recycling of Culture Media Containing Floating Cells. Tissue Eng 2004 Jan-Feb; 10(1-2):139-44. |
| Kamil SH, Vacanti MP, Aminuddin BS, Jackson MJ, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD. Tissue Engineering of a Human Sized and Shaped Auricle Using a Mold. Laryngoscope 2004 May; 114(5):867-70. |
| Kamil SH, Vacanti MP, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: Microtia Chondrocytes as a Donor Source for Tissue Engineered Cartilage. Laryngoscope 2004 Dec; 114 (12): 2187-2190. |
| Kamil, SH, Akiyama M, Vacanti MP, Zaporojan V, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: Tissue engineered cartilage: Utilization of autologous serum and serum-free medium for chondrocyte cartilage. Int J Ped Otol 2007 Jan; 71(1): 71-5. |
| Monroy A, Kojima K, Ghanem MA, Paz AC, Kamil, SH, Vacanti CA, Eavey RD: Cartilage “bioshell” tissue engineered protective layer. Int J Ped Otol 2007Apr;71(4)547-52. |
| Atrunduaga M, Quintanilla-Dieck M de L, Betensky R, Nicolau Y, Hamdan U, Osorno G, Brent B, Eavey RD, Seidman CE, Seidman JG: Genetic and environmental contributions to congenital external ear malformations and isolated microtia: a classical twin study (Accepted by the New Eng J Med). |
Research Awards related to Microtia
The following awards have been issued to Research Fellows studying microtia with Dr Eavey and collaborators.
| 1993 | First prize in Basic Research by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology, Scottsdale (Dr. Angela Rodriguez) |
| 1994 | Second prize in Basic Research by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology, Palm Desert (Dr. Carlos Arevalo Silva) |
| 2000 | The William Potsic First Prize in Basic Research by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology, Orlando (Dr. Aminuddin Bin Saim) |
| 2002 | First Prize, poster category, by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology, Boca Raton (Dr. Syed Kamil) |
| 2003 | The William Potsic First Prize in Basic Research by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology, Nashville (Dr. Syed Kamil) |
| 2006 | The Charles Ferguson 2nd Prize in clinical research by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology (Dr Yamileth Nicolau) |
| 2009 | The William Potsic First Prize in Basic Research by the American Society of Pediatric Otolaryngology, Seattle (Dr. Maria Artunduaga) |
To make an appointment, e-mail us at: MicrotiaAtresiaClinic@VUMC.org or call ph: 615-343-6166.