Epistaxis in Lokoja, Nigeria:A Review of 49 Cases

Bleeding from the nose is common and causes a lot of apprehension among family members especially if it is the first episode. It has been stated that 60% of people will have at least an episode of nose bleeding during their life time and that 6% of them will need referral to the ENT Surgeon. The disease has been known since the time of Hippocrates and the simple technique of digital compression of the external nose (pinching the ala nasi) is called the Hippocratic technique. Hospital admissions with or without surgical interventions are usually not necessary in many patients except in refractory cases.

This is a 3 year review of all patients seen in the Ear, Nose and Throat outpatient’s clinic from January 2013 to December 2015. Patients’ demographic factors, aetiologic factors and treatment modality were extracted from the case files, studied and analyzed. Results presented in text and table format.

A total number of 61 cases were seen during the period, 7 files could not be retrieved and 5 had inadequate information. So the remaining 49 patients were 26 males (53.1%) and 23 Females (46.9%) with a male to female ratio of 1.1:1. Their ages ranged from 3 to 80 years with the 31-40 age range recording the highest number (22.4%) of epistaxis. Twenty two patients (44.9%) had an unknown cause (idiopathic), followed by trauma (18.4%) and rhinosinusitis (14.3%). Anterior nasal packing (57.1%) was the most successful modality of treatment offered while Hippocratic technique combined with ice pack on nasal bridge (10.2%) was the least.

Epistaxis is the most common and most difficult nasal emergencies with challenging issues despite improved medical facilities. However, the prognosis is good with early referral to the ENT Surgeon.