Surgery using a common plastic can help straighten a crooked nose, often a difficult deformity to correct, an Australian study said Monday.
“This procedure is safe, effective, and reliable,” the report said.
The surgery involves use of porous polyethylene grafts to form an “ideal graft size and shape” regardless of how much underlying cartilage is available, it added. “It leaves the external nose straight, smooth, and strong ...”
The study came from Martyn Mendelsohn of the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney and covered 41 cases of nasal plastic surgery where the plastic graft was used to structurally reinforce the nose.
The graft material gives increased strength against further trauma and provides more stability than previous techniques, according to the study.
Crookedness in the middle part of the nose is most often caused by trauma leading to fracture, although problems at birth from use of a forceps as well as disease can cause the deformity, according to medical literature.
A crooked nose can obstruct the airway and fixing it is often difficult because the skin and the tissue just beneath are very thin, and the underlying structure is springy and difficult to straighten, the report said.
The study was published in the March issue of the Archives of Facial Plastic Surgery.
All 41 patients on which the technique was used had substantial improvement in straightening of the middle third of the nose, the study reported.