Amphotericin B nasal irrigation as an adjuvant therapy after functional endoscopic sinus surgery

Fungus-driven inflammation is proposed to play an important role in the pathogenesis of chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS). Previous studies evaluated the efficacy of intranasal amphotericin B (AMB) in the treatment of patients with CRS, but the results were controversial. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of 100 μg/mL of AMB nasal irrigation as postoperative care after functional endoscopic sinus surgery (FESS).

Patients with CRS who received FESS for treatment were recruited and randomly assigned to two groups at 1 month after surgery. Patients in the AMB group received 100 μg/mL of AMB nasal irrigation daily for 2 months, and those in the normal saline (NS) group received NS solution nasal irrigation daily for 2 months. Pre-FESS, pre-irrigation, and postirrigation sinonasal symptoms were assessed by questionnaires, and the patients received endoscopic examination, acoustic rhinometry, smell test, and saccharine transit test.

Seventy-seven patients were enrolled between June 2012 and December 2014. Among the patients who completed the study, 38 received AMB irrigation, and 39 received NS solution irrigation. Although all the patients reported improvement after irrigation, there was no difference in outcome between patients who received AMB and those who received NS solution.

Our study showed that nasal irrigation with 100 μg/mL of AMB did not confer a greater benefit than that of NS solution nasal irrigation in post-FESS care.