Chronic Granulomatous Invasive Fungal Sinusitis in Patients With Immunocompetence: A Review

We aimed to study the literature on chronic granulomatous invasive fungal sinusitis to elucidate the changing trends in the management of the disease.

Using specific keywords, we searched the PubMed, PubMed Central, and Scopus databases over the past 50 years, which yielded 938 articles in the English language.

Scrutiny of 147 relevant articles revealed 15 homogenous case series (255 cases of histologically proven chronic granulomatous fungal sinusitis alone) and 8 heterogeneous case series (patients with other types of fungal sinusitis included), which were analyzed in detail (all with >5 cases each).

The disease typically affected middle-aged adults with immunocompetence. Most reports were from Sudan, India, and Saudi Arabia. A slowly progressive orbital, cheek, or palatal mass with proptosis (88.2%) or sinonasal symptoms (39.2%) was typical. Ethmoid (57.2%) and maxillary (51.4%) sinuses were chiefly affected with intracranial extension in 35.1%. Aspergillus flavus (64%) was the most frequent isolate reported. Endoscopic excision (78.8%) followed by azole therapy was the preferred treatment in recent reports. Orbital exenteration and craniotomy were infrequently performed. Complete resolution or improvement was reported in 91.3% of patients. Mortality ranged from 5.9% to 22.2%. There is a trend in the literature toward less radical and disfiguring surgery and preferential use of azoles, with good outcomes even in advanced cases.

Chronic granulomatous fungal sinusitis should be diagnosed on the basis of well-defined histopathologic features. A combination of endoscopic sinus surgery and azole therapy usually yields good outcomes.