Abstract
Middle turbinate headache syndrome is a disease which is not widely recognized, even though it is identified as giving rise to a sharp pain with the mucosa of the middle turbinate coming in contact with that of the nasal septum. A case of middle turbinate headache syndrome is reported on in this report.
The patient was a 33-year-old male, who consulted a doctor with the primary complaint of nasal obstruction. On sinus CT imaging at the first hospital visit, right septal deviation and a pneumatized left middle turbinate were detected and existed to such an extent that septoplasty and left-side endoscopic sinus surgery were performed to improve the nasal obstruction. However, with the nasal obstruction postoperatively improved, the patient began to complain of a left nose pain and sinus CT was once again performed. As a result, it was found that the rectification of the right septal deviation postoperatively had brought the middle turbinate in contact with the nasal septum. That said, the concha bullosa of middle turbinate was resected via endoscopic sinus surgery and, furthermore, the curvature of the upper part of the nasal septum was rectified, with the result that all pain was completely ameliorated after the surgery.
The pain was caused by the middle turbinate iatrogenically coming into both contact with the nasal septum and concha bullosa, hence the pain was removed after the second procedure. When we consider that the pain dissipated after the separation of the middle turbinate and nasal septum, we propose that this particular clinical case endorses the existence of middle turbinate headache syndrome.
