Correlation between preoperative computed tomography and operative findings in functional endoscopic sinus surgery.

This study investigated the correlation between diagnostic parameters and surgical findings in patients undergoing functional endoscopic sinus surgery (FESS) for chronic sinusitis. The parameters that were reviewed included the radiologist's report on the computed tomographic (CT) scan, the surgeon's reading of the CT scan, the operative findings, and the histopathology report. A retrospective analysis was conducted of 84 patients with chronic maxillary and ethmoid disease who were treated by the senior author (M.F.P.) over a 5-year period. The average concurrent agreement between the radiologist's CT report and the surgeon's CT interpretation was 92.26% for unilateral ethmoid disease, 83.73% for unilateral maxillary disease, 79.50% for bilateral ethmoid disease, and 64.28% for bilateral maxillary disease. The operative findings compared more closely with the surgeon's CT interpretation. The results of this study underscore the importance of clinical correlation in the surgical management of chronic sinus disease.