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Acute sinusitis: symptoms
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
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Acute sinusitis is not only a local lesion, but a disease not of an organism with the reaction of many systems and organs. Manifestations of a general reaction to inflammation of the paranasal sinuses, in particular, are febrile state and typical changes in blood (with acute and exacerbation of chronic sinusitis), as well as general malaise, weakness, headaches. Since these symptoms are accompanied by other focal infections, in the diagnosis of sinusitis, local manifestations of inflammation are of primary importance.
The most common complaints with inflammation of the paranasal sinuses are: headaches, difficulty in nasal breathing, pathological discharge from the nose and nasopharynx, smell disorder.
Headaches are considered one of the leading symptoms of acute and exacerbation of chronic sinusitis. Their appearance is explained by the influence of the inflammatory process on the membranes of the brain due to the anatomical proximity of the paranasal sinuses with the cranial cavity, the presence of wide connections between the vascular, lymphatic and nervous systems of the nasal cavity, paranasal sinuses and meninges. However, despite purulent inflammation of one or more sinuses, complaints of headache are sometimes absent, especially if there is a good outflow of exudate through natural anastomoses. Headache with sinusitis is usually diffuse. However, with more pronounced inflammation in one of the sinuses, the headache may be local, characteristic of the defeat of this particular sinus.
Violation of nasal breathing with sinusitis can be both periodic and permanent, be one-sided or bilateral and become the result of obstruction of the nasal passages caused by edema or hyperplasia of the mucous membrane, polyps or pathological secret. With unilateral sinusitis, the difficulty of nasal breathing usually corresponds to the side of the lesion. With allergic and vasomotor sinusitis often note the alternate laying of one or the other half of the nose.
Pathological discharge from the nose, like obstruction of nasal breathing, can be temporary and permanent, one-sided and two-sided. Usually, the increase in the number of excretions coincides with the exacerbation of the inflammatory process in the sinuses, however, if there is a violation of the outflow from the cavity, this correspondence may not exist. Often, patients indicate the flow of the discharge into the nasopharynx. Which is usually the case with diseases of the sphenoid sinus and the posterior cells of the trellis labyrinth,
At external survey it is possible to note the swelling of the soft facial tissues in the projection of one or another sinus, which happens in cases of severe acute sinusitis or exacerbation of chronic as a result of involvement in the process of the periosteum. In a number of cases, the development of periostitis is manifested only by pain upon palpation of the anterior walls of the paranasal sinuses.
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