The Determination of Sphenoid Sinus Dimensions in Turkish Healthy Adult Subjects: An MRI Study

Abstract

The aim of this study was to identify sphenoid sinus dimensions; and distance between columella nasal and sphenoid sinus; and columella nasal and hypophysis in healthy adult subjects using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and to evaluate differences between genders and age groups. The MRI results of 300 healthy subjects (192 females; 108 males) aged 18-68 years were studied. The midsagittal and axial images were used for shape of the sphenoid sinus, and the distance measurements of its related adjacent structures on MRI. The mean values of the distance between columella nasal; and columella nasal and hypophysis; and sinus sphenoidalis width were 65.73±5.22 mm, 87.05±4.79 mm and 37.67±8.40 mm in females respectively, whereas the same values were 71.79±5.06 mm, 94.52±6.07 mm and 41.95±9.32 mm in males, respectively. The means of all measurements were lower in healthy female subjects than in healthy males.Additionally, the classification of sphenoid sinus types were determined to be postsellar type (131), sellar type (46), presellar type (14) and conchal type (1) in females, respectively. The same measurement were determined as postsellar type (82), sellar type (23) and presellar type (3) in males, respectively. Differences between sexes and age related changes were observed in the variations of the size, location and shape of sphenoid sinus were observed The observations presented in this report have defined anatomic parameters that need to be taken into consideration for reference data to determine gender discrepancies, age related changes and helpful for radiologists and clinicians to plan safe surgical approach and avoid surgical risks.

Morphometric characteristics of the sphenoid sinus and potential influencing factors: a retrospective assessment using cone beam computed tomography (CBCT)

“…Gibelli et al highlighted a high frequency of the sellar type (74%) in their study (Gibelli et al 2018b). However, the post-sellar type was found to be most frequent (74.0%) in the present sample, which was in accordance with earlier data from Öksüzler et al andKim et al 2013b (Öksüzler et al 2019). Besides, present findings also revealed that a mature sinus (> 12 years) (Pallanch et al 2013) might exhibit postsellar extension until middle age.…”

“…In the current study, the normal volume and mean maximum diameter recorded were 6576.92 mm 3 and 30.48 mm, respectively which was in accordance with the findings of Oliveira et al (Oliveira et al 2017). These values were somewhat smaller as compared to the dimensions reported in previous studies (Gibelli et al 2018a;Öksüzler et al 2019;Ozer et al 2018). A reasonable explanation for such contrasting results could be the existence of an ethnic variability, since the aforementioned authors (Gibelli et al 2018a;Öksüzler et al 2019;Ozer et al 2018) conducted their studies in Italian and Turkish subjects.…”

“…These values were somewhat smaller as compared to the dimensions reported in previous studies (Gibelli et al 2018a;Öksüzler et al 2019;Ozer et al 2018). A reasonable explanation for such contrasting results could be the existence of an ethnic variability, since the aforementioned authors (Gibelli et al 2018a;Öksüzler et al 2019;Ozer et al 2018) conducted their studies in Italian and Turkish subjects. Likewise, Kim et al reported larger volumes in Asian subjects of Korean descent (Kim et al 2010), which was in contrast to the present findings.…”