Sinusitis – Post Operative Debridement

Transcript

After sinus surgery, you’re left with open spaces into the sinuses that need to be maintained in that open configuration. Oftentimes, during the healing process, the areas where we operate can develop crust, blood clots and other buildup of mucus that can actually be very detrimental to the healing process. And the reason for that is that these substances can form or rather serve as a bridge for scar tissue to form. And the last thing we want after we’ve opened up the sinuses is for scar tissue to block off the passages we just worked so hard to open up. So debridements are extremely important in the postoperative recovery and for the longterm benefits of surgery. So what are debridements? Well, basically a debridement is just a removal of these substances we were just discussing. It basically involves you coming into the office on several occasions after surgery, and usually around one week, maybe a week or two later, several weeks after that, or a month later, essentially what we do is we numb your nasal cavity with sprays until you’re comfortable.

And then I use a camera to look inside your nose and in your sinuses and carefully remove all these substances. And that can be with the use of suctions or little graspers, micro instruments that we can put into your nose. And again, the idea is to clean the sinuses. We want to prevent infections. We want to prevent scar tissue formation and really provide you with long-term benefits from the surgery itself. It’s very tolerable. The initial debridements right after surgery can be a little bit more tender, obviously, because you’ve just been through surgery and you’re inflamed and a little bit more sensitive, but as time goes on, they become easier and easier and less and less cleaning is needed as the sinuses continue to heal and you regain the function of the sinus lining and get closer and closer to complete sinus health.