Evaluation of Surgical Outcome in Rhinoplasty: A Comparison Between Rasp and Osteotome in Dorsal Hump Removal.

Dorsal hump reduction is a crucial point of rhinoplasty, as it has a great impact on the final shape of nasal pyramid. Depending on morphological features of the hump, its removal is usually obtained by the use of an osteotome or a rasp. In our study, we describe a closed rhinoplasty technique performed in 2 groups of patients: the only difference between the groups is the surgical tools used during the dorsal hump removal phase (rasp vs the 5-mm osteotome).We used 2 questionnaires of quality of life (QoL), Nasal Obstruction Symptom Evaluation (NOSE), and Rhinoplasty Outcome Evaluation (ROE) questionnaire, to evaluate postoperative outcome (6 months after surgery).Closed rhinoplasty was performed in 107 patients. Dorsal hump removal was carried out with rasp on 35 patients; while in 72 cases, it was performed using a 5-mm osteotome. All the patients were given 2 copies of NOSE and ROE questionnaires (1 month before surgery and 6 months after surgery) to evaluate postoperative QoL. In our study emerged that the use of osteotome in dorsal hump reduction is associated with a better aesthetic outcome (evaluated by analyzing patients QoL with ROE questionnaire) without any difference between the 2 groups in terms of functional outcome (expressed by NOSE questionnaire), major and minor complications and surgical procedure duration.

External osteotomy in rhinoplasty: Piezosurgery vs osteotome.

PURPOSE: To achieve the desired outcome in rhinoplasty depends on many factors. Osteotomy and surgical reshaping of nasal bones are important steps that require careful planning and execution. The availability of different tools raises the question of which one provides significant advantages for both technique and surgical outcome. Our prospective randomized pilot study compared the outcome of post-traumatic rhinoplasty performed with two different external techniques: ultrasound osteotomic cut using the Piezosurgery Medical Device (Mectron, Carasco, Italy) and traditional external osteotomy. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Forty-four lateral osteotomies of the nasal wall were performed in twenty-two patients. In twelve patients the osteotomies were conducted with a 2-mm traditional osteotome (control group), while in the remaining ten patients these were done with the Piezosurgery Medical Device (experimental group). RESULTS: At the postoperative evaluation, significantly lower pain, edema and ecchymosis were noticed in the experimental group (p<0.05). Moreover, the endoscopic evaluation showed fewer mucosal injuries in the experimental group (p<0.05), whereas bleeding, symmetry of the pyramid and presence of external scars, were similar in the two groups. CONCLUSIONS: In the present study, Piezosurgery Medical Device allowed for safe lateral osteotomies in rhinoplasty preliminarily demonstrating the potential to reduce some of the most frequent complications of rhinoplasty.