Although this is a seemingly simple problem, it nevertheless confuses many patients. First of all, there are various brands of cleaning swabs in the market supermarkets, the price difference is quite a lot, some people may be greedy for cheap. According to reports, there are indeed some poor quality cotton swabs on the market, the raw materials used similar to the black cotton of the dirty cotton after bleaching production, in order to look neat also add white latex, the production site simply can not meet the health standards, with such poor quality raw materials, health can not meet the standards of cotton swabs wipe the ear canal, not only can not play a clean role, but may lead to aggravation of the disease. So advise patients not to be too frugal in this regard, to buy trusted medical swabs from regular stores. Secondly, although medical swabs are neatly made, convenient and hygienic, some patients have narrow ear canals and may have commercially available swabs that are relatively thick and not as convenient to use. So if possible, you can compare among a variety of medical swabs and choose the one with a thinner tip, which may be more suitable. Careful patients may notice that otolaryngologists rarely use medical swabs when performing external ear canal cleaning; most use homemade swabs made from rolled cotton (a type of copper swab stick). However, for most patients, this is slightly more complicated to make and can easily lead to foreign bodies in the cotton of the external ear canal if not made properly, so it is not highly recommended for the average patient. There is a way to compensate for this, if the swab head is thicker and the ear canal is narrower, a portion of the cotton can be removed appropriately, but care should be taken not to leave the hard core of the swab head exposed so as not to cause accidental damage when cleaning, and also to not cause the swab head to loosen and cause a foreign body of cotton in the external ear canal.