Psychopathologic Evaluation in Patients With Nasal Bone Fractures.

Background

Nasal bone fractures are pretty common. The most common causes include interpersonal violence, traffic accidents, sports injuries, and falls. This study aimed to assess patients presenting with nasal bone fractures not only for nasal trauma but also for personality disorders, impulsivity, and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) using psychiatric questionnaires.

Methods

The study included 41 patients, and the control group consisted of 43 volunteers without nasal bone fracture; neither the patients nor the volunteers had previously been diagnosed with or treated for psychiatric disorders. The psychiatric questionnaires administered were the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised-Short Form (EPQR-S), the Barratt Impulsivity Scale-Short Form (BIS-11-SF), and Turgay's Adult ADD/ADHD DSM-IV-based Scale.

Results

The most common cause of nasal bone fractures in our study was violence (41.5%), followed by traffic accidents (29.3%), falls (17%), and sports injuries (12.2%). In the EPQR-S assessment, the nasal bone fracture (NBF) group had significantly-higher total scores than the control group (CG) (P < .001). In the subscales of the questionnaire, extroversion, psychoticism, and lie subscale scores were higher in the NBF group than in the CG. In the BIS-11-SF assessment, the NBF group had higher total scores than the CG (P < .001). Assessment using Turgay's adult ADD/ADHD DSM IV-based diagnostic screening and rating scale revealed no statistically-significant difference between the NBF group and the CG in terms of attention deficit and hyperactivity.

Conclusion

We found that psychoticism patterns and impulsivity were more prevalent in the patient group, whereas ADD/ADHD was not. The results of our study suggest that performing a psychiatric assessment may be the right decision in patients presenting with NBFs caused by violence, whether they are the aggressor or the victim.