The objective of the present work was to study the state of the hearing function and the prevalence of ear pathologies in the applicants and students of a higher education institution. A total of 44.525 subjects at the age varying from 15 to 30 years were available for the examination of whom 42.829 ones were involved in the routine medical examination programs for the applicants and students; 1696 persons presenting with acute ear diseases and impairment of hearing passed the primary medical examination in the University polyclinic. The hearing function was evaluated with the help of the speech and tuning fork tests; in part of the patients it was evaluated by tonal threshold audiometry in both the standard and the extended frequency ranges, tympanometry, registration of the ipsilateral acoustic reflex, and a questionnaire study. Chronic ear pathology is known to occur in 1.77-2.09% of the young people; it is the third most frequent condition after diseases of throat, nose, and paranasal sinuses in the structure of chronic ENT morbidity. The structure of chronic ear diseases is dominated by Eustachian tube pathology (0.99-1.4%) followed by chronic middle and inner ear diseases (0.35-0.62% and 0.15-0.26% respectively). The commonest chronic disease of the middle ear is adhesive otitis media that is accompanied by the conductive impairment of hearing in 53.5% of the cases. Next in importance is chronic suppurative otitis media associated with the conductive or mixed-type loss of hearing in 91.7% of the patients. The subclinical form of sensorineural hearing loss was found in 11.7-15.1% of the young subjects Including minimal sensorineural hearing loss (enhancement of the hearing threshold by 1-3 frequencies) in 11.7-12.4% of the patients. A frequent cause of impaired hearing in the case of chronic sensorineural hearing loss is a single or repeated acoustic trauma.