Rhinoplasty: What You Need To Know?

I am Dr. Talwar, a cosmetic surgeon from New Delhi.

Today I will be speaking about the Rhinoplasty. Rhinoplasty is actually the beautification of the nose and this is usually done after the age of puberty. People bring children of 10-11 years old age and ask if their nose can be corrected or not. But we feel that once the growth of the nose is complete, which is around the puberty time 14-15 years,  then we can do the rhinoplasty or the beautification of the nose.

Now in rhinoplasty, there are many techniques which are performed or many problems which can be solved. Suppose you have got a hump on the nose, then that naturally can be corrected. We can shave it off and then fracture the nose from the side and make it narrower. If your nose is flat, then we can raise the height of the nose. It can be done either by an implant, or you can take local tissues like cartilage from septum or year or the chest and with this, the height of the nose can be raised.

Then there are tip deformities. Tip deformity is like - suppose the height is less, or it is more round then we can correct that by trimming the lower cartilages. If the nose is broad, then we can narrow it down by cutting the extra tissues. So there are different problems which can be rectified by different techniques.

The question the patient asks is whether there will be any skin mark or not? So there are two techniques- either we can make a cut from inside the nose and then go inside and correct the nose, then another is the open approach which is also getting more and more popular in which we just make a small cut in the base and lift up the whole skin like a bonnet of the car and correct whatever is to be done and then put down the skin back. So this is an open approach. Open and close both the approaches are being followed and scars are hardly visible. The second thing which they ask for is - whether it is to be done under local anesthesia or general anesthesia.

So most of the cases are done under local anesthesia, in which we do not make the patient unconscious but yes if the bone has to be reduced or the bone has to be cut or fractured and narrowed so in that case we generally prefer to give a general anesthesia because the patient mind gets some pain. After rhinoplasty, usually the dressing nose is packed for 2 days and packing of the nose is removed but the plaster or the tape is kept for 7-10 days time for total healing. The results in certain cases are immediate, if you raise the nose it is immediate but if you do the tip work then the result will be apparent after 3 months onwards and the final shape might come after 9-12 months time.

So you need to have patience when you go for a rhinoplasty and otherwise, it's a 1-day job. In morning we do the surgery, if it is a local anesthesia in the patient can go on the same day. If it is under general anesthesia then the by evening also we can send them back. So practically no admission or maybe 8-12 hours admission is required maximum and the dressing is required for 7-10 days time. The results are very rewarding in this case. Male and female both are coming forward for this surgery because the nose is one of the most prominent part of your face. Thank you very much!