Bridge Too High After Asian Rhinoplasty?

At 2 weeks following rhinoplasty, you are very early in your recovery and there is still a lot of swelling present. Recovery after rhinoplasty will vary based on the person, characteristics of the nasal tissues and what was done during surgery. It can take somewhere in and around 12-18 months to see the final results. If you have thick skin, swelling will take much longer to settle. The areas with thicker skin in the nose such as the tip, alar rims and radix will require longer to settle. Also there appears to be a linear decrease in swelling for the first several months followed by a period where the swelling fluctuates (sometimes little or no swelling and other times more swelling) before the nose settles. It is important to be patient during your recovery - it will take a while to see the final results. When diced cartilage fascia is used for dorsal augmentation, there can be significant swelling of the grafts in addition to the skin and soft tissue swelling. This will take time to resolve. During your recovery, many of the changes you will see in the dorsal height (ie., fullness of the bridge) -becoming smaller and less prominent- is more related to resolution of this swelling. This will continue to change for about 1 year postoperatively resulting in a lower bridge. During the early recovery period, it is important not to put pressure on the dorsum as the diced cartilage fascia grafts can be quite malleable and you may distort the contour of your dorsum. You should discuss with your surgeon when would it be appropriate for you to resume the use of your glasses.

Ear cartilage and fascia will swell a bit initially, but will rapidly decrease over the first month or two.  Glasses are discouraged during this period because they can leave indentations and contour irregularities on the bridge.  Taping the nose may help the swelling resolve faster.  

You are still relatively early in your healing, and you still have swelling along the bridge of your nose.  Especially with the cartilage + fascia, it may take months before you see the final height of your bridge (dorsum).  Your surgeon many use kenalog or 5-fluorouracil injections to help expedite the resolution of swelling (edema).  Glasses can distort the cartilage+fascia graft that was used on your nose and also alter the shape of your bridge, so that's why we ask patients to avoid them after Asian rhinoplasty.