Adjunctive Treatment of Pediatric Adenoidal Hypertrophy: A Review.

CONTEXT

Adenoids play an important role in the protection of the upper respiratory tract against pathogens. Nonphysiological enlargement of adenoids is defined as adenoid hypertrophy (AH). In treating AH, physicians prefer medical therapy and often disregard adjunctive methods. Studies on the effects of adjunctive methods on adenoid tissue are quite scarce.

OBJECTIVE

The current review aims to examine the clinical studies that have investigated adjunctive methods-nasal irrigation, herbal therapy, bacteriotherapy, and halotherapy-used to treat AH and its associated symptoms and to evaluate their effectiveness in pediatric patients.

DESIGN

The research team performed a narrative review by searching seven electronic databases (Pubmed, Cochrane Library, Google Scholar, Web of Science, EMBASE, Science Citation Index and Elsevier) were used for the literature search. The search used the keywords adenoid hypertrophy, adjunctive treatment, nasal irrigation, herbal medications, bacteriotherapy and halotherapy.

SETTING

This study was took place in Department of Anatomy, Medicine Faculty, Istanbul Medeniyet University.

RESULTS

The nasal irrigation with hypertonic solution decreased to size of enlarged adenoid tissue. The bacteriotherapy used with nasal spray and tablet form decreased to surgery rate and adenoid size.The adenoid and/or tonsillar hypertrophy were decreased by halotherapy used with micronized, iodized-salt aerosol.

CONCLUSIONS

A review of studies on this matter indicates that the studied adjunctive methods can be used safely in the treatment of AH, either separately or in combination with conventional medical treatment. However further clinical studies are needed on this topic.