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przyssawka t1_j1jgskg wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in What specifically about ginger/menthol/wasabi causes one's sinuses to open? by Bartendiesthrowaway

The confusion may be due to poorly written wikipedia entry on conchae, which is extremely inconsistent:

>Conchae (/ˈkɒnkiː/), also called a nasal turbinate or turbinal,[1][2] is a long, narrow, curled shelf of bone that protrudes into the breathing passage of the nose

followed immediately by:

>Conchae are composed of pseudostratified columnar, ciliated respiratory epithelium with a thick, vascular, and erectile glandular tissue layer.

I'm a head and neck surgeon and I've never heard anyone in the field make a distinction between the mucosa covering the concha and the bony part, mostly because it's the mucosal part that's important for things like FESS procedure (outside of cases of Concha Bullosa).

It's similar to the labyrinth of the inner ear. Can mean the petrous part alone but it's commonly used to refer to what it contains as well. Anatomically the whole structure is called a concha and that includes the mucosa.

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kbolser t1_j1jhbfk wrote

I need to read up on it more (and I don’t mean Wikipedia). I respect your credentials, but I’m still not convinced from a strictly anatomical perspective

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przyssawka t1_j1jhn7i wrote

What you're claiming may be an actual anatomical distinction, I'm just saying from a professional perspective I have never heard any fellow ENT not include the erectile tissue as part of the "concha"

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