The prevalence of orbital complications among children and adults with acute rhinosinusitis

Acute rhinosinusitis occurs commonly in children and adults being commoner in children. The prognosis is favorable in majority of cases. OBJECTIVE: To investigate orbital complications in children and adult with sinusitis. METHOD: Patients attending ENT clinic with sinusitis from January 2010 until January 2012 were included. Patients were classified into two groups according to their age. First involved children aged less than 16 and second included adults older than 16 years. Clinical picture, sinus involved, management and outcome were compared. RESULTS: The total number of patients were 616. Orbital complications were seen in 36 patients (5.8%). Twenty six patients (72.2%) were children (21 had preseptal and 5 had orbital cellulitis) and ten patients (27.8%) were adults (5 with preseptal, three with orbital cellulitis and 2 with abscess). The most common orbital complication was preseptal cellulitis (72.2%) followed by orbital cellulitis and abscess (22.2% and 5.6% respectively). The commonest sinus involved was ethmoidal in children and mixed sinus pathology in adults. The majority of patients responded to medical treatment. CONCLUSION: Orbital complications of sinusitis are commoner in children than adults and have favorable prognosis. Keywords: Sinusitis, cellulitis, preseptal, abscess.