Keywords: Nasal obstruction, turbinectomy, septoplasty.

Abstract: A study was conducted on 14 patients submitted to parcial turbinectomy of the inferior turbinate associated with septoplasty or rhinoseptoplasty at the Otorhinolaryngology Department of the University Hospital, Faculty of Medicine of Ribeirão Preto, University of São Paulo, from August 1990 to December 1991. This represents a sample of patients with chronic nasal obstruction caused by hipertrophy of the lower turbinates associated with septal deviation resistant to the usual clinical treatments. All patients were submitted to pre- and postoperative clinical (medical history and otorhinolaryngologic examination) and histological evaluation, and patients with incomplete data were excluded from Me study. The study reports the clinical treatments and preoperative signs and symptoms (nasal obstruction, pruritus, headache, and compensating buccal respiration, among others) and discusses the good clinical results reported by the patients one year after partial turbinectomy of the inferior turbinate. The histological findings detected at the level of the inferior turbinate parcially removed at the time of turbinectomy are described together with those obtained from a biopsy taken from the remaining portion of the inferior turbinate in a reepithelialized area one year after turbinectomy. The study was carried out under the light microscope and showed that the ciliated cylindrical pseudostratified epithelium was the predominant epithelial type, present in 42,86% of the samples studied preoperatively. In the postoperative phase there was a predominance of stratified pavement epithelium, present in 78,57% of the samples studied. Histopathological evaluation during this phase revealed the absence of cilia in all epithelia analyzed as well as signs of epithelial atrophy. Finally, it is concluded that the association of partial turbinectomy of the inferior turbinate with septoplasty represents an effective surgical method for the corretion of chronic nasal obstruction due to inferior turbinate hipertrophy and septal deviation which does not respond to habitual clinical treatment. The postoperative histopathological findings show that prolonged follow-up of turbinectomized patients and a judicious and precise surgical indication, is very important for detection of the clinical atrophy.