• Reference Number: HEY731/2024
• Departments: Neurology and Neurosurgery
• Last Updated: 31 December 2024

You can translate this leaflet by selecting a language from the dropdown menu:

Afrikaans Albanian Amharic Arabic Armenian Azerbaijani Basque Belarusian Bengali Bosnian Bulgarian Catalan Cebuano Chichewa Chinese (Simplified) Chinese (Traditional) Corsican Croatian Czech Danish Dutch English Esperanto Estonian Filipino Finnish French Frisian Galician Georgian German Greek Gujarati Haitian Creole Hausa Hawaiian Hebrew Hindi Hmong Hungarian Icelandic Igbo Indonesian Irish Italian Japanese Javanese Kannada Kazakh Khmer Korean Kurdish (Kurmanji) Kyrgyz Lao Latin Latvian Lithuanian Luxembourgish Macedonian Malagasy Malay Malayalam Maltese Maori Marathi Mongolian Myanmar (Burmese) Nepali Norwegian Pashto Persian Polish Portuguese Punjabi Romanian Russian Samoan Scottish Gaelic Serbian Sesotho Shona Sindhi Sinhala Slovak Slovenian Somali Spanish Sundanese Swahili Swedish Tajik Tamil Telugu Thai Turkish Ukrainian Urdu Uzbek Vietnamese Welsh Xhosa Yiddish Yoruba Zulu

English

Introduction

This advice sheet has been produced to give you information about nasal pack removal.  It is not meant to replace discussion between you and your doctor.  If after reading it, you require further explanation, please discuss this with the relevant person caring for you.

Dressings may have been placed into each side of your nose to prevent bleeding, either after a severe nosebleed or surgery. These dressings are called ‘packs’ and may block your nose so that you have to breathe through your mouth. Often, they are dissolvable but sometimes they need to be removed before you go home.

The nurse or doctor will explain the procedure to you before they start.  You will be encouraged to have pain relief 20 minutes prior to the removal of the pack. You will be asked if you need to use the bathroom before the procedure as you will need to rest in bed for 30 to 60 minutes after removal of the pack.

You may be asked to suck ice for 5 minutes prior to removal of the pack as this reduces the risk of bleeding after the removal of the pack but this is not necessary.

You will be asked to sit up in bed; the nurse or doctor will apply a white apron over your head and ask you to hold a bowl under your chin to hold the removed packs.

Packs are removed one side at a time.

Once removed, the nurse or doctor may apply pressure with their fingers to the fleshy part of your nose for 3 to 5 minutes. They will check for bleeding after 3 to  5 minutes. If no active bleeding is seen, a bolster dressing will be applied, which can stay in place until you get home.

The nurse or doctor may provide you with some ice. If you feel any bleeding or a trickling down the back of the throat or at the front, suck ice and use the buzzer provided to call nursing staff and then inform them.  If, after 30 minutes, there has been no bleeding, you can walk about after confirming this with the nursing or medical staff.