A comparison between conventional throat packs and pharyngeal placement of tampons in rhinology surgeries.
Abstract
Objective: the aim is to evaluate the incidence of postoperative throat pain, nausea and vomiting in patients that have been packed with either conventional gauze or pharyngeal tampons.
Methods We included adult patients who were booked for a rhinology surgery that needed throat packs. They were allocated into two groups, pharyngeal tampons, and conventional ribbon gauze. They were then assessed using visual analog scales and PONV impact scale respectively in the 1st, 4th, and 24th –hour.
Results VAS results show that tampons are better than gauze, with 25 out of 43 patients using tampons having low VAS scores after 24 hours whereas 23 out of 46 patients using gauze had low VAS scores after 24 hours.
The data shows that tampons are equivalent to gauze in terms of PONV.
Conclusion The study shows that the use of pharyngeal tampons is associated with decreased pain scores, however, it also shows that there no difference in postoperative nausea and vomiting.
Bullet points
  1. Posterior throat packs are often-used in rhinology surgery to help in protecting the airway against aspiration and in the reduction of ponv
  2. A conventional throat pack consists of gauze, but an alternative practice involves the pharyngeal placement of tampons
  3. Patient that were packed with pharyngeal tampons had a lower pain scores than the conventional throat pack group
  4. that there are no differences in post-operative nausea and vomiting in both groups.
  5. pharyngeal tampons are a suitable alternative -if not replacement - for conventional ribbon gauze