DETERMINATION OF CORRELATION OF DIAGNOSTIC NASAL ENDOSCOPY WITH COMPUTER TOMOGRAPHY IN DIAGNOSIS OF NASAL AND PARANASAL SINUS DISEASES AND MALFORMATIONS AND FREQUENCY OF THESE MALFORMATIONS

CT scan is the best method in the diagnosis of paranasal sinus diseases. The object of the present study was to show the efficiency of diagnostic endoscopy in diagnosing nasal paranasal sinus diseases and anomalies. If this method proves to be accurate, patients who refuse surgery can be diagnosed, managed and followed up through a reliable method that is cost-effective and decreases the unneccessary irradiation of patients. The frequency of some of the anatomical variations and structural anomalies of the nose and paranasal sinuses was determined. During a 14-month period, 70 cases(studying both left and right sides) those who fit out criteria, were used for the study. The clinical and radiologic stages were determined, separately. A correlation between the clinical stage and the radiologic stage or the opacification index scoring was found. Endoscopy alone is not a good method to detect the structural anomalies of the septum and turbinates. But with the absence of these anomalies a better correlation was found with CT scan. Frequency of these anomalies in our study were in the range of other conducted studies. The maxillary sinus was the most common diseased sinus in chronic sinusitis, and anterior ethmoid sinus was the second most common. However, in other studies the anterior ethmoid sinus is the most common and maxillary sinus is in the second place.