Functional endoscopic sinus surgery in children and adults

Functional endoscopic sinus surgery (FESS) has become a popular procedure f or the treatment of adults with chronic sinusitis. Recently, it has also be en applied in the pediatric population. It has been used to treat chronic s inusitis in our department since April 1988. As of March 1998, 1,112 patien ts were available for analysis by file and questionnaire review. Of the 1,1 12 patients, 104 patients (9.4%) who were 16 years of age or younger at the time they first underwent FESS in our department were included in the pedi atric endoscopic sinus surgery (PESS) group. The other 1,008 patients (90.6 %) were included in the ordinary FESS group. In total, 121 PESS and 1,106 ( adult) FESS operations were performed on these patients. Operative complica tions occurred in 5 PESS operations (4.1%) and 116 FESS operations (10.5%). The postoperative improvement rate was 84% in PESS and 77.1% in FESS. We c onclude that PESS can be applied to treat chronic sinusitis effectively in the pediatric population and with less morbidity than FESS.