Surgical reduction of hypertrophied inferior turbinates: a comparison of electrofulguration and partial resection.

Two adjunctive or primary surgical procedures, partial resection and electrofulguration, are popular today for reducing offending inferior turbinates. Both are relatively successful. However, there seems to be a growing consensus that judicious partial resection of the inferior turbinates is associated with a higher long-term success rate (86 versus 69 percent) as well as a lower postoperative morbidity rate. This paper outlines the specific symptom complex that brought 200 patients to corrective intranasal surgery. These are as follows: nasal obstruction (99 percent), sinus pressure headaches (61 percent), dry, raw pharynx (61 percent), abnormal migration of the nasal mucous blanket or "postnasal drip" (35 percent), and recurrent bacterial rhinosinusitis (57 percent). Based on this symptom complex, this paper attempts to give the expected long-term results when a single operator performed 100 consecutive operations using each technique.