Rhinitis refers to inflammation of the nasal passages and can be caused by allergies, infections, hormones, weather changes, and other irritants. The main types of rhinitis are allergic rhinitis (hay fever), non-allergic rhinitis, vasomotor rhinitis, infectious rhinitis, and hormonal rhinitis. Symptoms include sneezing, nasal congestion, runny nose, and watery eyes. While rhinitis is very common, it is often not studied extensively by epidemiologists due to its high prevalence and perception as a minor annoyance rather than serious condition. Diagnosis involves determining the cause through patient history, examination, and testing, and treatment focuses

1. Rhinitis
The stuffy nose!
by
Donald E Borden

2. Rhinitis is know as many things:
1. Allergenic Rhinitis ( Hay fever )
2. Non-allergenic Rhinitis
3. Vasomotor Rhinitis
4. Infectionous Rhinitis
5. Hormonal

3. Allergenic Rhinitis
Seasonal allergenic rhinitis (hay fever) is
mainly an alergy caused by outdoor
allergens such as tree, grass, weeds, and
mold spores. If you sneeze, have a runny or
stuffy nose during spring, summer, or fall
you may have hay fever. Hay fever is the
most common type of allergy problems.
Symptoms include sneezing, itching, runny
or stuffy nose, and red watery eyes.

4. NON-ALLERGENIC RHINITIS
Non-allergenic rhinitis involves chronic sneezing or
having a congested, drippy nose with no apperent
cause. The symptoms are similar to thoses of hay
fever, but there is no allergic reactions involved.
Nonallergic rhinitis can affect children and
adults, however is more common over the age of
20. More annoying than harmful, it can be triggered
by odors, irritants, weather, certain foods, or
another underlying condition. A diagnosis of
nonallergenic rhinitis is given after allergic is ruled
out by skin tests.

5. VASOMOTOR RHINITIS
Vasomotor rhinitis is also known as post-
nasal drip and nasal congestion. A person
with this type of rhinitis may have
symptoms when exsposed to temperature
and humudity changes. Symptoms can also
occur when exposed to smoke, strong
odors, perfumes, or even emotional upsets.
All of the above mentioned exposures
cause dialation in the blood vesseles in the
lining of the nose, which result in swelling
and drainage.

6. INFECTIONOUS RHINITIS
Infectionous rhinitis can occur as a cold, which may
clear rapidly or continue with symptoms that can
last a week or longer. Some people may devolpe
an actue or chronic bacterial infection. The most
common is the common cold which is 92% of the
time caused by Rhinovirues and Coronavirues.
Symptoms not only include runny or stuffy nose but
also sore throat, headache, and cough. Also noted
is an increase in colored (not clear as in other
rhinitis) yellowed or greenish thickend nasal
discharge.

7. HORMONAL RHINITIS
Hormonal rhinitis is often seen with... as the name
implies, hormonal changes. It often occurs with
pregnancy, puberty, hypotyroidism, and the
menstral cycle. The most common being pregancy
during the early tri-mester and last 2-3 weeks of
pregnancy. Hormonal rhinitis displayes the same
common traits as allergenic with a noticed increase
in clear nasal fluid discharge. It is not commonly
treated by any medication due the cause being
triggered by homones and the means to control it
would be to administer an anti-hormone blocker
that would cause an adverse reaction greater then
the annoyence of the rhinitis.

8. Pathogen and Virulence factors.
Virulence is the degree of pathogenecity or the
ability of a bacteria/virus to invade a host. Rhinitis
is a very common misconception that it in it's-self is
a pathogen. Its not. It is an outside agent that is
being dispelled from the body therfore being a sign
or a symptom and not a classic defenition of a
pathogen. Rhinitis is the outcome of the bodys
ability to produce mucous to trap
dust, pollen, pollution, bacteria, viruses, etc.. Nasal
fluid flows from the front of the nose to the rear of
the nose and down the throat. When to much
mucous is made then it cause an overflow which
pushes fluid out the front (runny nose).

9. Epidemiology of Rhinitis
Epidemiology is the study of health events, health
characterics, and health patterns in a population. Rhinitis
being one the most common misdiagnosed problems and
brushed off as just a cold, leads it to have great problems
understanding the epidemiology. It is seen everywheree on
the globe, including outer-space as in 1994 a shutlle mission
astronaught had non-allergenic rhinitis after his 5th day being
in outer-space. It has many causes from the weather,
pollutions, to simple human sensetivity. Also being that in the
medical field, rhinitis is seen more as an annoyense then a
true problem, most epidemioligist choose not to study rhinitis
but rather a more pressing or urgent matter.

10. Diagnosis, Treatment, Prevention
Diagnosis of minor rhinitis is usally done at home and is
gathred from previous exsperiances. More acute, severe, or
bothersome rhinitis is diagnosed by process of elemination
since so many factors can cause it. Skin tests for
allergic, blood tests or cultures for infectionous, palpatation
and visual for vasomotor, age range and education for
hormonal, process of elemination for nonallergenic. Most
treatment comes in forms of anti-histimine medication (OTC
or prescribed), nasal sprays, to home remidies or in worst
case senario, surgical closing of the nasal mucous ducts via
caterazation. Trying to prevent rhinitis is almsot an
impossable feat as almost any irrataint can cause it. Some
methods however are seasonal medication, removing your
self from a known cause (enviroment) or agent (smoking).
While having rhinitis might be misery it is in most cases not
life threating, and can not be 100% prevented.

11. BIBLIOGRAPHY
•www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/rhinitis
•www.acaai.org/allergist/allergies/rhinitis
•www.mayoclinic.com/nonallergencic/rhinitis
•www.nationaljewish.org/healthinfo/conditions/rhinitis
•www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/virulence
•www.johnhopkins.com/public/information/rhinitis
•www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/epidemiology
•www.ucsd.edu/medical/rhinitis
•www.youtube.com/videos/rhinitis