Histological analysis of the postnatal development of the nasal septum

The importance of the growth in the nasal septum for the development of the facial skeleton has often been stressed. An increase in dimension is well-known from radiographs. It was the purpose of the present study to describe the normal pattern of the growth sites of the nasal septum according to age and sex by histological and microradiographical examination of human autopsy material. The nasal septum was removed from 66 boys and 57 girls who had died in accidents. Decalcified sections for conventional histology as well as undecalcified sections for microradiography were prepared. The superior surface and posterior margin of the vomer as well as the vomeroethmoidal and the vomeromaxillary sutures were studied. It was obvious that increase in size of the vomer could mainly be ascribed to apposition on the superior surface and the posterior margin. This was seen until adult age. After the ethmoid bone was ossified, the connection between the vomer and the perpendicular plate of the ethmoid bone was a slightly sinuous suture in which growth occurred until puberty. The growth pattern implied that a forward, downward sliding of the vomer must take place in relation to the ethmoid bone and the cartilaginous septum. Frontal sections revealed that, after the establishment of the suture between the vomer and the perpendicular plate of the ethmoid, a cartilage island was embedded in the vomer surrounded by thin, fenestrated cortical bone blades. This cartilage still persisted in specimens from adults. There is, on the basis of the present findings, no reason to believe that the septal cartilage plays a major role in the forward, downward growth of the maxillary complex in homo.