I Find Breathing Difficult (Laboured) Through my Nose, Especially the Left Nostril? (photo)

The first step in determining why you're having trouble breathing through your nose is to have a specialist (otolaryngologist or facial plastic surgeon) exam you. This is an invaluble step in finding out what could be causing your symptoms and what treatments may help.

Unfortunately, the MRI images you provided are fairly limited when in comes to evaluating the nasal cavity and septum. A CT scan is more typically used to evaluate for sinus disease and to see if that could be causing your headache symptoms.

You can check out my web reference link below to learn more about septoplasty surgery -- a common treatment for nasal blockage.

There are reasons why patients ultimately breathe out of one side of the nose or the other.  These issues include a deviated septum, turbinate hypertrophy and valve collapse (vestibular stenosis) on the affected side.  Many of these issues are due to congenital or traumatic causes.  An MRI of the sinuses is an inadequate test to look at any sinus related issues and a CAT scan of the paranasal sinuses must be performed to look for any sinus disease.  These are performed in both axilla and coronal dimensions for full view of the sinus anatomy.  Any sinus and breathing related surgeries can be done simultaneously.  Please see the link below for our sinus surgery brochure.