Anatomical Study of Nasal Septal Cartilage in Eastern Chinese

Background: Asians tend to have foreshortened noses with more increased nostril show. In recent years, the nasal septal cartilage has been widely used in caudal septal advancement and nasal tip projection in East Asian. However, a relatively small quantity of less firm nasal cartilage was observed in East Asians compared with Caucasians and very few articles have been found dealing with septal cartilage anatomy of Chinese. Objective: The length, height, area, and thickness of nasal septal cartilage in 10 eastern Chinese were studied to provide anatomic data for the septorhinoplasty or harvesting of cartilage graft. Methods: The septal cartilages in 10 adult cadavers were anatomized and measured for their length, height, area, and thickness. Results: The average length and height of septal cartilage were respectively 2.83±0.47 cm and 2.41±0.39 cm. The average area was 4.94±1.26 cm^2. The average thickness is 0.97±0.15 mm, with the greatest thickness in region b 1.14±0.26 mm, the least thickness in region e (0.83±0.22) mm and region a (0.81±0.27) mm. Conclusion: The findings of this study reinforce the principle of key differences existing in the anatomic data of the septal cartilage between Asians and Caucasians.