118-123 – “Disaster Medicine” Journal

DISASTER MEDICINE No. 2 •2026

doi: 10.33266/2070-1004-2026-2

EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH

Original article

Method for Determining Tympanic Membrane Rupture under Shock-Acoustic Exposure

Drozdov S.V.¹

¹ State Research Center – Burnasyan Federal Medical Biophysical Center of Federal Medical Biological Agency, Moscow, Russian Federation

UDC 616.282.4-001.26-07

P. 118-123

Summary. The purpose of the study is objectification of the determination of rupture of the eardrum of rabbits under shock-acoustic influences.
Materials and methods of research. To develop a method for detecting eardrum rupture during shock-acoustic stimulation, experimental studies were conducted to simulate ear barotrauma in 100 healthy, sexually mature male Soviet Chinchilla rabbits. A shock wave generated by a shot from an air pistol was used as the traumatic factor (peak sound pressure levels corresponded to a 0.5 probability of eardrum rupture). Quantitative characteristics of the eardrum’s condition were determined by measuring the impedance characteristics of the external auditory canal. A sample of 700 measurements was compiled before the exposure, immediately after the exposure, and on the first and third days after the exposure. Confirmation of the presence/absence of eardrum rupture was determined by pathological examinations of the hearing organ. A model for calculating the probability of eardrum rupture under shock-acoustic impact was constructed using machine learning and the CatBoostClassifier method based on gradient boosting, and its quality was assessed using cross-validation.
The research was approved by the Bioethics Committee of the Burnazyan Federal Medical Biophysical Center of the FMBA of Russia on November 12, 2024, No. 1988.
The results of the study and their analysis. The high quality of the trained model (the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was 0.97, sensitivity was 0.92, and specificity was 0.91) confirmed that a comprehensive analysis of the impedance characteristics of the external auditory canal allows for the reliable in vivo detection of eardrum ruptures in rabbits. This method is suitable for establishing maximum permissible levels of shock-acoustic exposure that do not cause auditory barotrauma, as well as for determining the effectiveness of personal protective equipment against such exposures. To extrapolate the obtained data to humans, it is necessary to adapt the developed method to the anatomy of the human ear canal and test it on clinical data from patients with eardrum ruptures.

Keywords: barotrauma, mine-blast injury, rabbits, ruptured eardrum, shock-acoustic impact

For citation: Drozdov S.V. Method for Determining Tympanic Membrane Rupture under Shock-Acoustic Exposure. Meditsina Katastrof = Disaster Medicine. 2026;2:118-123 (In Russ.). doi:10.33266/2070-1004-2026-2-118-123

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The material was received 26.01.26; the article after peer review procedure 09.04.26; the Editorial Board accepted the article for publication 16.06.26