Management of a rare case of arytenoid mucosa oedema inducing stridor and cough

Objective: Current guidelines recommend a multidisciplinary systematic integrated approach to patient with chronic cough in which nowadays otolaryngologists play an increasingly valuable role as new procedures are used for evaluation and treatment. Surgery has been never taken into consideration to treat refractory chronic cough. Method: We present a rare case of arytenoid mucosa oedema inducing stridor and cough, lasting 8 months, that critically affected the quality of life of a 15-year-old adolescent arrived to our emergency department with prominent arytenoid oedema causing paroxysmal cough and laryngeal stridor and that was successfully treated by laryngeal debridement. Results: In this case report we observed that prominent swelling of arytenoid mucosa might sustain a vicious cycle of cough persistence and that laryngeal surgical debridement might interrupt it resolving the particular clinical condition. Conclusion: The description of this case could be of some help for clinicians to draw new insight about diagnosis and therapy of rare selected cases of chronic refractory cough. © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd.