Clik here to view.
“Doctor, I was wondering about…….”
Of the ten most common procedures in nose surgery, one of the leading requests is for surgical removal of a nose hump.
(Read more about the most common types of nose surgery.)
If you’re thinking about rhinoplasty to remove a nasal bump, there are a few things you should ask about.
Q: What causes the hump?
A. The first thing your nose surgeon must answer: is the hump due to too much bone? Or, perhaps too much cartilage? Actually, it could be both. The nasal bridge is made of bone in the upper part while cartilage makes up the lower 60 percent of your nose. Nasal humps are usually a “family” nose.
Thus, some humps are on the bony part of the bridge so nose surgery removes the excess bone. Other cartilage-based humps can be trimmed.
But most nose humps are combinations of too much bone and cartilage. Your surgeon can tell by feeling your nose and by examining the inside of the nose during your first visit.
Q. How much smaller should the nose be?
A. With any luck, your nose surgeon will have computer imaging and be able to show – instead of explain – what your after surgery nose will most likely look like. Some patients, for ethnic reasons, want a slight remaining nasal hump. (Continued below.)
__________________________________________________________________________
The patient below shows her profile before rhinoplasty on the left. After nose surgery, the hump has been removed (right) to complement the other superb facial features. She also had surgery to improve her breathing while under the knife. (Robert Kotler, M.D. photos.)
Clik here to view.
Rhinoplasty, before and after
____________________________________________________________________________
(Learn more about computer imaging that shows a preview of after-surgery results.)
Q. Will my nose skin cooperate with hump reduction or removal?
A. If you have very thick skin, your nose surgeon may not be able to make your nose as small as you want. It takes decades of hands-on experience to learn, but the surgeon can tell how much reduction in the nose can be covered naturally after the procedure. If your skin is very thick and the surgeon reduced the nose bone and cartilage too much, the result would be bunched-up, excess skin on the nose. But if your skin is thin, everything the surgeon does on the nasal framework will show through.
(Read more about rhinoplasty and skin thickness.)
Q. Will I need a “Radix graft?”
A. In some cases, grafts are put inside the nose where the nose meets the forehead; the idea is to help the dorsum – the part of the nose running from the nose tip to the level of the lower eyelid — not sit too low on the face.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Robert Kotler, M.D. is the seasoned, highly experienced cosmetic plastic surgeon and nose specialist who was featured in the very first episodes of the hit reality program about Beverly Hills plastic surgeons, Dr. 90210.