Rhinoplasty…Plastic surgery or ENT ?

Rhinoplasty, is one of the most frequently performed procedures in our department.

The operation of rhinoplasty has traditionally been between the disciplines of ENT and Plastic surgery, with continous diputes regarding who does it better, the ENT’s or Plastics ?

In my Plastic surgery department in Hospital Quiron Malaga I have tried to find the ideal soultion for this.

We have managed to contract one of Spain’s leading ENT, Dr.Ortiz, as a permanent staff member of our Plastic surgery department, enables us to operate all noses in a team of minimum two specialists, an ENT and a Plastic surgeon, which is really to the benefit of the outcome.

To my knowledge, there are only very few centres in Europe doing it this way (I am not aware of any other practice in Spain or the UK who does this as a standard protocol), but I think that it is a concept that is in th best interest of patients.

Our audit data confirms that this seems to be to the real benefit of patients. I have always enjoyed operating rhinoplasty very much, although rhinoplasty is a very delicate operation.

However, for the functional part of the operation I find it of real benefit to do this together with a very experienced ENT surgeon.

I do increasingly see patients who after purely aesthetic rhinoplasty report taht there breathing is better although they had not been aware of any impairment before.

We have also included pre-and intraoperative rhinoscopy into our protocol, which revelas for instance the need for turbinectomy (which we currently do in about 40-50% of our rhinoplasty patients).

Overall, the experience in my department does strongly encourage me to think that our protocol to operate noses in such an interspeciality team is a very good one.

Should you require some more extensive information on this procedure, either in the Department of Plastic Aesthetic and Reconstructive Surgery at Hospital Quiron Malaga or in Cirumed Clinic Marbella please contact us.