In patients with severe rhinosinusitis, FESS had little impact on the ability to smell, regardless of the method for assessing smell function. Subtle associations between olfactory function and the severity of chronic rhinosinusitis determined by CT were observed, however, preoperatively. The olfactory test measures were correlated with one another both pre- and postoperatively.

Our results showed that AMB irrigation improved symptoms and endoscopic scores but did not show superiority to saline irrigation alone in patients who have CRSsNP.

The indications for endoscopic sinus surgery (ESS) have been widely expanding since its introduction into sinus surgery. ESS has become an ideal method to manage certain orbital diseases and has the advantages of excellent visualization with minimal cosmetic and functional morbidity. In the Department of Otolaryngology of Taichung Veterans General Hospital from 1988 to 2005, 3,136 patients received ESS. Among them, a total of 108 patients received ESS for orbital diseases. These orbital diseases included orbital complications secondary to bacterial rhinosinusitis, fungal rhinosinusitis, skull base osteomyelitis and mucoceles, subperiosteal hematoma, Graves’ disease, traumatic optic neuropathy and orbital blowout fracture. Our results showed that ESS is effective in the management of some of these orbital diseases.

This goal of this study was to demonstrate whether fungi were present in the ethmoid sinus in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis. Before surgery, swab specimens were collected from the middle meatus for conventional fungal cultures, and lavaged fluid was collected from the nasal cavity for fungal cultures by Ponikau's method. During surgery, tissue specimens were taken from the inferior turbinate and the anterior ethmoid sinus for conventional fungal cultures and detection of fungal DNA by polymerase chain reaction. The ethmoid sinus mucosa with coating mucus was also collected for fungal cultures by Ponikau's method. Among 53 specimens, three middle meatal specimens and 27 lavaged specimens (50.9%) grew fungi. Inferior turbinal mucosa did not grow fungi, but three ethmoid sinus specimens grew fungi by the conventional fungal culture method and by Ponikau's method. Alternaria DNA was detected in 42 inferior turbinal specimens (79.3%) and in 39 ethmoid sinus specimens (73.6%). Our study showed that although fungi were rarely cultured from the ethmoid sinus Alternaria DNA was detected in most of the ethmoid sinus mucosa.