Nasal Foreign Bodies in 299 Cases

Although nasal foreign bodies very commonplace in daily clinical practice, their simplicity in pathology and diagnosis is so unique that case reports based upon a large number have been rather scarce. We report 299 verified cases of nasal foreign bodies seen during the past 13 years from January 1986 to December 1998, at our institute, together with clinical and statistical analysis. The total number of first visits during the surveyed period was 55,312 and nasal foreign bodies comprised 0.54%. Of these 217 subjects (72.6%) appeared in emergencies. Man comprised 172 (58%) and woman 127 (42%), with the right side comprising 166 cases (57%), the left side 123 (42%) and bilateral 3 cases (1%). In monthly distribution, cases are more often seen in November and December and less often seen in January, with the monthly average being 25. In age distribution, the majority were seen in those under 10 years old, excluding 6 cases. The average age was 4.0 and the range 1 month to 81 years. In the majority of cases, foreign bodies remained only a short time (with in 24 hour) but in 15 cases stayed rather a long time (over 24 hour). In specificity, the majority of foreign bodies were toys, with plastic bullets used with air guns most frequent, in 46 cases (15.3%), followed by beads in 36 cases (12.0%). Other foreign bodies seen comparatively often were pieces of tissue paper, buttons, and plastic toys components.