before <front photo before surgery> before <side photo before surgery> after <45-degree side photo after surgery> after <side photo after surgery> To help with understanding, I’ll first write down my original situation! - Mild dorsal hump (*I found out I had a hump when I went to a dermatology clinic for fillers;) - My nose was neither that low nor high. It wasn’t a pretty nose either. - Three previous filler procedures, with the last filler procedure 4 months before surgery - 70% functional purpose, 30% cosmetic purpose - I decided to have surgery at a clinic that performs donor dermis, ear cartilage, and the three rhinitis-related procedures
I’ll write in as much detail as possible. I was also grateful before my surgery to the people who wrote detailed reviews for me.
1. Dissolving injection, blood test It seems to differ by hospital, but this was done for free for me. I’m usually very timid, so I looked up lots of reviews before going, but it honestly hurt a lot. It hurt so much that I screamed out loud. My nose felt hot and the pain was really severe, and because of a hyaluronidase side effect, my face started swelling quickly (they should have given me an allergy shot beforehand). I was so embarrassed I can’t even upload photos here. It was the first time in my life I’d seen my face swell up like that. Even the hospital seemed surprised, so they gave me an allergy shot and a swelling shot, and I spent an hour getting injections before going into work. The swelling lasted about a week. If you have allergies, please make sure to get an allergy shot in advance
2. Surgery day Before surgery, they took before photos and I had a final consultation with the doctor. We did one last Photoshop virtual simulation, and my preference was something natural, like “barely noticeable!” The doctor wanted to make the tip a bit more defined so it would look slightly higher and straighter. Our opinions diverged a bit. They say if you make it truly natural, you’ll definitely regret it later and end up having revision surgery. That line tempted me a bit, so I compromised between my opinion and the doctor’s to decide the design. Thinking about it now, it was a genius move. It’s been a little over two weeks and I think it looks just right now. I’m even a little disappointed because I think the swelling will still go down more. I guess I’d never lived with a higher nose in my life, so I didn’t know.
I was in a case where I took a day off during the holiday break and had surgery, but there were a lot of people. So even though my surgery was scheduled for 10 o’clock, I think I didn’t actually go in until almost 1 o’clock. I’m a smoker, so before going to the hospital I smoked two cigarettes and went in.
They removed the hair? inside my nose, prepared me for surgery, and I lay down on the operating table. How about everyone else? I was scared. When I was 20, I got double eyelid surgery without knowing anything, and after that I only had dermatology procedures, so once I lay on the operating table I had all kinds of thoughts. Should I stop now? Should I have just lived like this? While I was worrying like that, the anesthesia injection went in. The doctor asked, “Are you sleepy?” and I answered that I wasn’t, then immediately fell asleep.
I remember the nurses waking me up and opening my eyes, but I don’t remember whether I walked to the recovery room myself or not. Usually the surgery takes 2 to 2.5 hours, but they said mine took more than 5 hours. They said it took so long because my oxygen saturation kept dropping during the surgery. And they said there was a lot of foreign material in my throat, so they suctioned a lot. When I woke up, my throat hurt so much. The throat pain was much worse than the blocked nose. I was discharged with a pain relief injection attached.
Important here! ★★★★★You absolutely need a guardian★★★★★ There were many reviews saying people came alone, had surgery, then quickly took an express bus home, so I thought I’d come alone too, but an older sister I know said absolutely not, that she knew well because she had two fake-nose younger siblings in the family, and she came as my guardian. I was really, really grateful. I’ll explain why.
- When I was groggy after anesthesia, I couldn’t remember anything the doctor said about the surgery progress. (My sister told me the next day) - (It depends on the person, but) the anesthesia didn’t wear off well for me, so I couldn’t speak properly or even walk properly - When I went to the hospital pharmacy after staying in the recovery room for a bit, my sister handled the medicine for me - My sister drove me home and I slept - She even watched until I safely got home and lay down on the bed - I was jealous of people who had boyfriends
3. The hellish night on the day of surgery I work and also take online classes, so before going to the hospital I set everything up on my desk so I could study when I got home, but I really couldn’t do anything I lay in bed thinking I was being reckless. I was still not fully awake from the anesthesia and kept sleeping, but every 30 minutes I woke up because my mouth was dry and my throat hurt, so I wet my mouth with water. I repeated that until the next morning. Blocked nose + dizziness + constant sleepiness + throat pain + dry mouth = this place is hell
4. Hellish days on days 2 to 3 after surgery I went to the hospital for aftercare (it was a little disappointing that a nurse did it without the doctor) and changed my gauze, applied ointment, and walked for 30 minutes on my own. I diligently took and used pumpkin juice, danggwisusan, Elassae, cold compresses, walks, coconut water, and hospital medicine! If you search YouTube for nose surgery reviews, these are the famous products that come up. I bought and used the same ones. I swelled much less than I expected. (Why?) I barely bruised too. I thought hard about why, and I think it was because of G B J H (not an ad, bought with my own money). My body constitution normally swells easily and bruises badly, so I had prepared myself mentally, but I swelled less. I usually swell a lot, so I had been taking it steadily for a month before surgery, and I think that’s why I swelled less.
*Personally, days 1 to 5 after surgery were the hardest. You have to eat properly, breathe through your mouth, can’t sleep, your face swells, the tape is on, time moves horribly slowly, you can’t smoke, pumpkin juice tastes bad When I looked at nose surgery reviews, there were so many people saying “I want to die,” and I wondered why, but I also wanted to end my life together with my fake nose. I got through each day while watching Squid Game.
5. One week after surgery: bearable days in hell This is the time to remove the splint and take out the stitches from the outside and inside of the nose and the ear. Don’t be surprised if your nose looks too much like Avatar when the splint comes off. I thought my nose surgery had failed too and was really depressed, but the swelling goes down day by day. And when they used suction to remove the foreign matter that looked like boogers, it felt so good. I didn’t know because of my rhinitis, but I learned that oh, so this is what smell exists in the world. The smell of coffee, the smell of our house, the clean laundry scent from my cat’s paws, the fabric-softener smell from my mom’s clothes at my parents’ home There were so many smells I hadn’t known before, it was fascinating, and I was glad I wasn’t breathing 100% through my mouth. Still, the inside of the nose is still swollen and boogers still get stuck often, so this is the period when you breathe 50% through your mouth and 50% through your nose.
6. From one week to two weeks after surgery: days of hell you can just get through I went back to work starting on day 8 after surgery. Based on having had surgery, I recommend staying home for at least a week, or at least 5 days. Because normal life is hard + you become extra sensitive + you have to be careful with the nose + work. Personally, from this point on it’s a war with boogers. Boogers get stuck like crazy. They say you can blow your nose only after a month. I tried gently removing them with cotton swabs and gave up. The inside of the nose is still swollen, so not even a finger fits in. I kept enduring it and finally bought a nose sweeper on day 15. The boogers harden, so you can’t get them all out, but sometimes you harvest a big one. I’ve talked too much about boogers, but my nose still feels like someone else’s. It’s hard and just feels like they stuck on a piece of plaster or something. It feels very uncomfortable when yawning or sneezing. The tip of the nose hasn’t fully regained sensation yet.
*I didn’t wear makeup until day 14, and started wearing makeup from week 2.
7. Before & after photos
*Front photo before surgery *Side photo before surgery *45-degree side photo after surgery *Side photo after surgery
8. In conclusion, would I recommend functional nose surgery? My answer is NO. I don’t regret having the surgery, but if I could go back, I don’t think I would do it again. It’s only been two weeks, but the swelling is going down well, the nostrils are symmetrical, and the nose isn’t crooked. I’m still not dissatisfied with the result. Even so, why NO? Because there is too much you have to accept. Unless your rhinitis is so severe that you really want to cut your nose off, and unless you have a very severe complex about your nose, I recommend taking rhinitis medicine, getting fillers, and just living with it. For reference, even though I decided on functional nose surgery because my rhinitis was extremely severe, my answer is still NO. I’ll write the reasons.
1) It’s incredibly painful after surgery. I already wrote about this above, but it was so painful that I never want to go through it again.
2) No one can guarantee the outcome after surgery I only learned this after having the surgery. I think surgery requires a three-way balance of the doctor’s skill + your own condition and health + luck. No matter how skillfully the doctor shapes it like a master, if your condition is poor or your luck is bad, the nose can become crooked and the result seems bad. Of course, even if both your condition and the doctor’s skill are good, if your luck is bad, problems like scar tissue can occur.
3) Don’t have surgery during peak season This is the part I regret the most. I looked at an enormous amount of reviews about the hospital I chose, really, very, very many. I expected there would be a lot of people because it was a holiday, but there were really many. The doctor was busy, the nurses were busy, and the front desk was busy too. I wanted careful, attentive care, but it felt like they were doing the aftercare in a rushed, hurried “quick quick” way. I understand part of it because there were too many people, but as the person who had a knife put to my face, I felt uneasy.
4) Discuss price and schedule with the clinic manager, and discuss the surgery itself with the doctor In the end, the doctor is the one who performs the surgery. If you have questions about the surgery, talk to the doctor.
5) Claiming private medical insurance benefits It was my first time claiming more than 1 million won in insurance benefits, and insurers basically don’t want to pay easily (for reference, I’m with a major insurance company, and my job is even in insurance content). They keep asking questions and demanding related documents. This really stressed me out. I responded to everything one by one and submitted all the documents. Because it was a 2013 private medical policy, I got a 90% refund. The functional nose clinic promotes that private medical claims are possible, but they are not responsible for the insurance claim. That responsibility lies with the insured person/policyholder. I also dug through so many reviews about this part, and there were people who couldn’t get reimbursed or got very little.
6) A time bomb-like nose that you have to worry about for the rest of your life I thought I had checked the side effects fairly well before surgery, but I hadn’t. Because of expectations and hope that “it will go well,” I only looked at the good side too much. Whether or not an implant is used, once you have nose surgery, you cannot avoid the risk of side effects. In other words, there is no surgery in this world with a 0% side-effect risk. The problem is that nobody knows whether it will appear after 1 year, 5 years, or 10 years. Right now it’s been two weeks since my surgery and there are no problems, but that doesn’t mean I can be certain there won’t be problems in the future. If you go to this community, there are so many reviews about second and third revision surgeries. Those people didn’t go through several surgeries because they wanted to, either. And you always have to keep in mind that it could become your story too. The more times you touch the nose, the worse the shape gets and the higher the cost becomes. That is the biggest reason I decided I wouldn’t have the surgery again if I went back.
7) In the end, it’s unpredictable case by case For each person, the surgical method, amount of swelling, degree of bruising, post-op course, and whether side effects occur are all different. It’s still frightening because it’s hard to predict accurately. Most people’s swelling goes down in weeks 1 to 2, but that might not be me. Even if someone says the surgery only cost a certain amount, my surgery cost could be different.
Please don’t trust reviews too blindly, and make a careful decision. I didn’t receive a single won, but there are too many brokers.