DOI: 10.36347/sjams.2014.v02i05.041

Pages: 1691-1695

Nasal mucociliary clearance is an important defensive mechanism of the nose. Nasal obstruction may lead to histological alterations in the nasal mucosa and also impair the mucociliary function. It is speculated that the nasal septal deviation, the commonest cause of nasal obstruction, disturbs the mucociliary activity in the nose. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the differences in mucociliary clearance preoperatively as well as postoperatively following septal surgery and to study histological characteristics of bilateral nasal septal mucosa in patients with deviated septum. Mucociliary transport was measured by saccharine test in both nasal cavities in 20 patients with septal deviation preoperatively and postoperatively in the first month following septal surgery. Their septal mucosae were taken during surgery, and the histological differences in the lamina propria of the septal mucosae were compared under a light microscope. Nasal mucociliary transport was also measured bilaterally in 18 of those patients, three months following surgery. Clinically the concave side showed longer saccharine clearance time than the convex side. Histopathologically, the inflammatory cells heavily infiltrated the concave side with less seromucinous glands. Saccharine clearance time improved three months after surgery. So we conclude that the concave-side septal mucosae have impaired mucociliary transport, presumably due to increased inflammation and decreased density of the glandular acini and that the surgeries for a deviated septum have positive effects on the mucociliary clearance mechanism.