Causes and management of epistaxis at a district hospital

ABSTRACT

To determine causes, types, laterality, need for hospital admission and success rate of treatment modalities of epistaxis. This study was conducted at Department of ENT, Mufti Mehmood Memorial Teaching Hospital, D.I. Khan, Pakistan from September 2010 to June 2012. All patients of acute epistaxis due to any cause were included. Those in whom bleeding stopped spontaneously were excluded. The data for the following nine variables was collected; gender, age in years, age group, cause, type and laterality of epistaxis, need for hospital admission and success rate of treatment modalities. Out of 275 patients. 199 [64%] were male and 76 [36%] female. Mean age of the patients was 38.30 +/- 23.69 years. Trauma was the commonest [46.9%] cause followed by hypertension [26.9%]. Anterior epistaxis was commoner [61.45%] than posterior [20.75%]. Silver Nitrate Cautry was the commonest [57.80%] treatment modality followed by anterior nasal packing [31.3%]. The success rate was 91.80% for Silver Nitrate Cautry. Carrying good success rate, Silver Nitrate Cautry is a preferred choice for treatment of anterior epistaxsis