ear, nose, and throat disorders
How To Treat Anterior Epistaxis With Cautery
Introduction
Epistaxis (nasal hemorrhage) can often be stopped with cautery (sealing off a blood vessel using current or chemicals). Epistaxis may be due to bleeding from the anterior or posterior nasal passage. Anterior epistaxis may be treated with digital compression by applying firm sustained compression of the lower one third of the nose for 15 full minutes. Pressure can be applied by the treating clinician or by patients and caregivers under the direction of the clinician. An alternative to digital compression is the use of a commercial nose clip, if available. Applying local vasoconstrictors to the nasal cavity can be a useful adjunct to digital nasal compression. If pinching is unsuccessful and the bleeding site is accessible and can be localized on anterior rhinoscopy, the next step is to control anterior epistaxis using cautery, which avoids some disadvantages of How To Treat Anterior Epistaxis With Nasal Packing (eg, discomfort, risk of infection, migration of packing material). If bleeding continues from an unidentified anterior site despite use of nasal compression and cautery, How To Treat Anterior Epistaxis With Nasal Packing is required. If bleeding is seen in the posterior pharynx but not in the anterior nasal passage, a posterior epistaxis should be considered. How To Treat Posterior Epistaxis With a Balloon is managed differently from anterior epistaxis, so identifying the site of bleeding is important whenever possible. (See also Epistaxis and 