For How Long Can Breathing Difficulty Persist After Rhinoplasty?

Just as the outside of your nose is swollen, the inside lining of you nose will be quite swollen after rhinoplasty.  At 2 weeks, this should begin to subside.  However, the mucosal lining may take 6-12 weeks before returning to normal after rhinoplasty depending on the amount of work done.  

While you may have some difficulty in the early stage of your recovery following surgery, due to swelling, as the swelling subsides you should be able to breathe normally again.

Swelling (both inside and outside of the nose) can persist for months.  Dryness and crusting inside of the nose can also contribute to breathing problems.

 

This is a tough question to answer because everyone is different  If you had no airway problems before surgery and you feel "stuffed up", then it is most likely post-op swelling. This usually gets better as the tissues heal.  This may take 6-12 weeks. If you had difficulty breathing before surgery and you had surgery to try to improve your breathing, you may or may not have improvement after , and it could potentially be worse.  Usually patients have improvement in this case but some do not.

The inside of the nose will remain swollen and reactive for about eight weeks after rhinoplasty. There is no way to speed the process though saline nasal sprays may help, and a cold air humidifier at night to rest the nasal lining. Avoid the temptation to use nasal sprays for cold congestion as the airway will open, however there will be a rebound effect which can prolong the recovery.
Best of luck,
peterejohnsonmd