Clinical Effect and Safety of Endoscopic Sinus Surgery in Patients over Seventy

Sohn, Jung Hyeob; Cho, Kyoung Rai

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES
Chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) is common in the elderly. There are increasing evidence that endoscopic sinus surgery (ESS) can be used to manage geriatric patients safely, although there are still concerns about complications after ESS. Therefore, the clinical effect and the safety of ESS in old patients was evaluated in the present study.
SUBJECTS AND METHOD
Retrospective observational studies were performed based on medical records of patients over the age of 70 and who underwent ESS for CRS from January 2009 to December 2017. The clinical effect of ESS was assessed by comparing the sino-nasal outcome test (SNOT-22) scores before and 3 months after surgery. The safety of the operation was evaluated by the occurrence of postoperative major surgical (skull base, orbital and hemorrhage) and medical (ventricular fibrillation, ischemic attack, primary cardiac arrest, cerebrovascular accident, pneumonia, other organ failure and death) complications.
RESULTS
Seventy three subjects were enrolled in this study. Bilateral disease was observed in 37 cases (50.7%), and CRS with nasal polyp was found in 31 cases (42.5%). Eight patients (11.0%) had revision cases. The majority (93.2%) had at least one comorbid condition and got prescribed related medicine (87.7%). There was a significant decrease in SNOT-22 score after surgery. Furthermore, there were no major surgical or medical complications except two cases with epistaxis.
CONCLUSION
CRS in geriatric patients can also be treated effectively and safely by ESS as it is done for younger adults. However, as the incidence of comorbidities is high in elderly subjects, it is important to evaluate the risk factors preoperatively.