Several doctors had believed that it was either allergic rhinitis or sinusitis, the inflammation of cavities around the nasal passages, that had caused a 20-year-old man from Taoyuan County to suffer frequently from a blocked or runny nose — until they found a tooth in his nasal cavity.
Taoyuan General Hospital’s ear nose and throat department director Cheng Chueh-yi (鄭爵儀) on Saturday discussed the recent case, in which the patient had suffered from chronic congestion in and discharge from his left nasal passage for years and all the doctors he saw diagnosed him with either allergic rhinitis or sinusitis.
“However, none of the physicians had managed to cure the conditions that the patient said had severely affected his sleep, his daily life and relationship with others,” Cheng said.
Cheng first performed a nasal endoscopy on the man and only found a polyp in his left nasal cavity.
It was only after Cheng arranged a computed tomography scan of the patient’s nose that he discovered a 1cm tooth hidden in his maxillary sinus, a pyramidal cavity whose base is formed by the lateral wall of the nasal cavity.
“We presume that the ectopically erupted tooth has existed in the man’s nasal cavity for several years, causing inflammation of the surrounding tissues that eventually led to the uncomfortable symptoms,” Cheng said.
Cheng said that because the man had all his adult teeth, it was most likely that the misplaced tooth was actually an extra tooth developed during puberty that grew upward into the nasal cavity due to pressure from neighboring teeth.
“The patient’s symptoms have improved significantly after the tooth was surgically removed,” Cheng said.
In some cases, ectopically erupted teeth straddle both the oral and nasal cavities, while in other situations, they form entirely within the nose, Cheng said, adding that common symptoms include unilateral nosebleeds, as well as nasal discharge or congestion.
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