Three Sinusitis Questions and Answers

While it is always best to seek professional help in answering your health queries, being armed with basic information by browsing through internet articles or health books can be, of course, an added advantage. In fact, these days, when massive information can be availed at a click of your mouse, it will be completely someone’s loss to remain naïve about common health problems which may affect him/her and/or loved ones. The following write-up presents some basic information about sinusitis in an easy-to-read Q&A format.

How is “Pansinusitis” Different from Sinusitis?

The inflammation of the sinus cavities or sinuses is termed as sinusitis. Humans actually have eight sinuses in the head. Sinusitis may involve only one or just few or all of the sinus cavities. Pansinusitis is a medical term used to refer specifically to a condition in which all sinuses are simultaneously affected.

What are the Signs and Symptoms?

Whether you have one or all your sinuses affected, the manifestations are the same. These include nasal congestion; fever (especially in children); production of copious amounts of nasal secretion that may be clear, yellowish or even green in color; persistent bad breath; bad taste in the back of throat and a decreased sense of smell and taste. Aside from these symptoms which are very similar to those of the common colds, a sinus infection (another term used to refer to sinusitis) can also bring about facial pain. This sensation of pain brought about by the building up of pressure within the affected sinus or sinuses is felt over the area of the affected sinus or sinuses.

What Can You Do About Sinusitis?

Sinusitis is among the conditions that tops America’s list of most common ailments. Fortunately, it is treatable with a high percentage of success rate.

Medications for sinusitis may include a combination of decongestants, corticosteroids and antibiotics. While some of these medications are safe and widely used that they can be availed over-the-counter, some would necessitate a doctor’s prescription. Sinusitis medications can be administered by oral intake or topically. Nowadays, more and more patients are getting into topical administration because the effect is much faster, since the drugs are applied directly on the affected area rather than being digested and processed before finally being absorbed in the blood stream, as in the case of oral medications. 

Topical treatment techniques include nasal sprays. Unfortunately, for now, only nasal corticosteroids are available in this form. Another technique is through the use of a nebulizer. A nebulizer is a machine which turns liquid medication into vapor that can be inhaled directly by the patient. Nebulizers have been used for a long time by asthma and COPD patients to administer bronchodilators such as salbutamol to make their breathing easier. Now, compounding pharmacies, such as Sinus Dynamics, have created their complete line of sinusitis medications ready for use with their state-of-art nebulizers, including the SinusAero. This nebulizer is portable and makes treatment so fast and easy. The secret lies in SinusAero’s ability to consistently aerosolize medications into particles as tiny as 1.0 to 3.3 microns (smaller than the drug particles in nasal sprays) to ensure the active ingredients of the medication gets through even the smallest openings of the inflamed sinus cavities.