OBSCURE LOW GRADE CHRONIC INFECTIONS OF THE ETHMOID SINUSES

Abstract

The diagnosis of chronic infection of the ethmoid sinuses is one of the difficult diagnostic problems in rhinology. It is particularly difficult in those low grade chronic infections of the ethmoid sinuses in which the nasal passages appear normal on one or more examinations and in which any symptoms pointing directly to the sinuses are so slight as to be almost nonexistent and yet in which there is sufficient systemic absorption from the ethmoid infection to cause very definite systemic symptoms. It is these cases of obscure low grade infection to which I wish to call attention because they are so frequently overlooked. Until a few years ago the diagnosis of chronic suppuration of the ethmoid sinuses depended on the examiner seeing pus coming from the middle or superior meatus after the maxillary, frontal or sphenoid sinus had been excluded as the source of the pus. A moment's reflection on