Pattern of epistaxis in Sokoto, Nigeria: a review of 72 cases

Epistaxis remains a common otorhinolaryngological emergency in most hospital emergency departments with varied manifestations. The pattern as seen in a tertiary health institution in Sokoto, Nigeria is the subject of this paper.

This is a 5 year retrospective study (January 1995-December 1999) of all cases of epistaxis presenting at or referred to the Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) Department of Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital (UDUTH) Sokoto, Nigeria whose data were analyzed.

A total number of 72 cases were seen with epistaxis out of 3,706 new cases seen at the ENT clinic. The incidence of epistaxis amongst UDUTH ENT patients was 19/1000. There were 45 males (62.5%) and 27 Females (37.5%) with a male to female ratio of 1.7:1. Their ages ranged between land 70 years with the 0-10 age range recording the highest number (26.4%). The commonest cause of epistaxis was idiopathic (29.2%), followed by trauma (27.8%) and hypertension (18.0%). Non surgical methods (97.2%) such as observation alone (34.7%) without active intervention to arrest bleeding, and nasal packing (34.7%), being the commonest intervention measures used to actively arrest bleeding followed by cauterization of the bleeding points (11.1%) were the frequent treatment measures. Surgical extirpation was carried out in 2 cases (2.8%) to arrest the epistaxis.

Although epistaxis is a common otorhinolaryngological emergency and varied in its manifestation, it affects mainly the young people (<30 years (62.5%)) in this environment with idiopathic, trauma, and hypertension being the common causes which are amendable to treatment with excellent results.