Septoplasty with Turbinate Resection

For at least over a year, Dave has known that there was something medically wrong with his nose. He has always had difficulty breathing through it, but it seems like it has gotten progressively worse over the years. About a year ago, Dave went into an ENT to have something done about it. He was told that he was suffering from two problems, a severe deviated septum to the right, and inflamed turbanates to the left. After getting this news, he was supposed to schedule a date to have them both surgically repaired. However, he didn’t do that. Dave was a bit nervous about going under the knife at that time, and decided to put it off.
Now 12 months later, Dave felt that this just had to be done. He couldn’t wait any longer with another child on the way, and so he went back into the doctor, and to no surprise was still suffering from the same two ailments. We scheduled the procedure for October 6, and Dave had no reservations about it this time.
Yesterday Dave went in to Davis Surgical Center in Layton to have a septoplasty with turbinate resection to correct his nasal problems. The whole procedure took about 45 minutes, and was deemed a success. For those unfamiliar with this procedure, the problem is that Dave’s septum (nasal bone) was sitting crookedly on the cartilage. This caused problems with his breathing through his right nostril. The left nostril had some larger than normal turbinates, which made it difficult for him to breathe through his left nostril. Combined together it made breathing very hard for Dave and sleeping very hard for Kristen (his snoring would keep her awake).
Dave’s pain was pretty bad at first. It took him about 4 hours and a few percocet to get on top of the pain. He would wear a gauze bandage under his nose to catch all the post surgical drainage and bleeding. And also would wear an ice pack over his nose to help calm down the swelling (though the weight of the ice pack was a little uncomfortable from time to time).
Luke has been rather cute through this whole process. He keeps checking on Dave and asking things like “You doing Okay there Dad?” and when Dave took off the gauze this morning Luke said “Hey Dad, you are getting better, that is sooooo good”. He really wants to help Mom take care of his Dad.
Last night was an unusually long one. Dave got most of his sleep during the day, and did get some during the night, but was waking about every hour to readjust. Kristen had spent the last 14 hours tending to the needs of Luke (which can be demanding) the needs of Dave (which were more demanding than normal), putting herself last on this list. Kristen is a wonderful nurse, mother and wife, and was totally exhausted from running up and down the stairs to wait on both Luke and Dave. When night came, she was really hoping to get some much needed rest. However, her instincts to nourish her family kept getting her up in the night just to check on the others. We finally got up in the morning around 6:00 am, but it felt like we had been in bed much longer.
Today Dave is doing much better. He is still taking the percocet every four hours, but is feeling that is probably not necessary any longer. He has taken the gauze from under his nose, and can now see the two tubular splints that are holding his septum in its new place. There is a little swelling, but that is to be expected. The bleeding has, for the most part, stopped. Kristen was able to get out of the house, and just be a mother for a few hours while Dave slept.
We will reward Kristen for all of her efforts this week by going to the Kelly Clarkson, Reba McEntire Concert on Friday just a few hours after Dave gets the splint removed from his nose.