cvw@alice.UUCP (Chris Van Wyk) (03/26/84)
Ihor Kinal's message included a lot of tips about treatment of sinus problems. Here are a couple more. I have had nasal polyps for almost twenty years, and ten years of allergy shots had no effect on either the polyp growth or the accompanying runny, stuffy head. So I have had to resort to medical and surgical relief. I don't know if any of my experience applies to people with sinus conditions other than polyposis. First, the medical remedies. I take the decongestant pseudoephedrine hydrochloride (Sudafed) and the antihistamine chlorpheniramine maleate (Chlor-trimeton) every day. Without them, I'm a goner. I take them early in the morning and them go back to bed for two hours; about half the time this keeps my sinuses at bay all day. It is also a nice way to cooperate with the drowsiness that accompanies taking the antihistamine. The principal bad side effect of the decongestant is its effect on blood pressure, so I have mine checked frequently. I also use beclomethasone (Beconase) nasal spray. As Ihor said, it's a steroid that reduces swelling in the sinuses. Since it's applied topically it doesn't have many of the bad side effects associated with steroids; I also find I can get by on about 1/8 to 1/4 the recommended dosage, which reduces even more the worry about side effects. Last year, however, I came down with a horrible case of thrush (the Beconase literature warns of occasional localized Candida albicans infections); imagine your throat and uvula covered with large canker sores--that's thrush. It won't kill you directly, but I think I lost about ten pounds because it hurt so much to eat. Once I had a sinus infection that was getting serious (with polyps that's not hard), and my ENT doctor prescribed a big dose of antibiotic along with a systemic steroid called Medrol. Medrol comes in a blister pack; you take 6 pills the first day, 5 the second, ..., 1 the sixth. Its effect on my sinuses was miraculous: I didn't need to take anything else, and by the third day I could even smell things. Unfortunately it's really only for emergencies, since it is a powerful steroid. There are also several surgical remedies. Most frequent are polypectomies, which are just an office procedure in which a few polyps are removed with a wire snare under local anesthesia. I usually even sit through the operation, although the occasional polyp will excite the vagus reflex upon removal, forcing me to lie down to avoid fainting. Polyps removed this way grow back pretty fast (say, within six months), and have stronger roots of scar tissue. I have also had an ethmoidectomy, which means scraping out all of the sinus tissue and some of the bony parts of the ethmoid sinus. I had it done in a hospital under general anesthesia; I don't think it's done any other way. The polyps came back a few years later. The ethmoid is between the eyes and during the operation some nerve was disturbed, leaving me with an incredible black eye for about two months. My doctors told me that if polyps come back soon after an ethmoidectomy they would plan to do a maxillary antrotomy, which means scraping out the maxillary sinuses through an opening in the upper jaw. So far I have not had to resort to this. I suppose it is unnecessary to repeat that if anyone knows a better way than all of this to deal with sinus problems, there are a lot of people who read netnews who would like to hear about it. Chris Van Wyk ihnp4!alice!cvw
barbaral@tekig1.UUCP (Barbara Lee) (03/27/84)
I haven't been following this discussion, so I'm sorry if I'm repeating info. Mom used to have a terrible hayfever problem, her sinuses got very congested, and she was pretty miserable. She had a series of acupuncture treatments, and now does not have any hayfever problem. For those of you in Palo Alto,CA area, the acupuncturist she saw was Miriam Lee, whose office is on California Ave. kitty corner to Printers Inc.