Design
Sinonasal surgery was performed to improve the conductive cause of OD. Surgery was performed by one surgeon under general anesthesia. Penicillin-based antibiotics were intravenously administrated for two days. Patients were treated endoscopically with debridement once a week as outpatients for the first month after discharge from the hospital. Oral antibiotics and intranasal corticosteroids were administrated for two weeks. Saline nasal irrigation was administrated once a day during postoperative care. Patients were treated once a month till the third month after the second month. Patients were assessed by an olfactory function test until the third month. The perioperative sinus endoscopy (POSE) scoring system was performed on all patients by a single experienced otorhinolaryngologist.
Following bilateral sinonasal surgery, patients started OT over a period of 12 weeks after their nasal packing was removed. The details of the OT procedure was explained to all patients who underwent bilateral ESS and they were offered the choice of continuing with the training program or waiting for a spontaneous recovery. The OT protocol and counselling on behavior and lifestyle modification was performed in accordance with our previously published method.5 Briefly, The patients were exposed to five different odorants twice a day: rose, lemon, cinnamon, orange, and peach. These odorants were chosen to represent odors that Koreans are familiar with. They were instructed to sniff the odorants for 10 seconds each morning and evening, with a 10-second break between each odorant. With the exception of OT, postoperative medical treatment did not differ between groups. Both groups were evaluated at 4, 8 and 12 weeks after the operation.