What Exactly Is an ENT Doctor?

What exactly is an ENT doctor, and what do they treat? An Ear, Nose & Throat Doctor (ENT) is a medical and surgical subspecialty focusing in the anatomy, physiology, and pathology of the head and neck region, and they are actually one of the oldest medical specialties. All in all, they can help diagnose or treat a number of different diseases and medical issues.

When it comes to accurately classifying them in the canon of medical specialists, they are actually known by their more formal name of "Otolaryngologist - Head and Neck Surgeon," even though many people refer to them as Ear, Nose and Throat doctors.

To make it simple, they can be thought of as medical experts with advanced surgical training in everything contained in the human head and/or neck except the eyeball and central nervous system (the brain and spinal cord). After thinking about this for a couple of seconds, one realizes that these doctors are responsible for knowing about and caring for a lot of different problems that may arise in the head and neck region. This makes them experts in a variety of different medical issues and diseases, and more importantly, determining the best way to treat them.

The problems treated by ENT doctors can vary greatly, from recurrent ear infections, allergy, chronic tonsillitis, chronic sinusitis, dizziness, hearing loss, thyroid disease, parathyroid disease, head and neck cancer, skin cancer, obstructive sleep apnea, to traumatic and cosmetic defects of the face and neck. But that is not it, this list of problems and treatments can really go on and on. Sometimes the treatment for these medical diagnoses is "medical", having to use medicines and tools like immunotherapy (allergy shots) to adequately treat a disease process, but sometimes it can also be "surgical".

Some of the common surgeries that an ENT doctor might perform are ear tube placement, tonsillectomy, adenoidectomy, endoscopic sinus surgery, balloon sinuplasty (Acclarent 穢), thyroidectomy, parathyroidectomy, skin cancer removal and reconstruction, rhinoplasty, septoplasty, and turbinate reduction.

Another peculiarity that most ENT doctors love about their medical specialty is all the different age groups they get to treat. Medical problems of the ear, nose, and throat affect all age groups - from little babies to the elderly. ENTs often have the privilege of treating a whole family's ear, nose, and throat issues - Baby's ear infections, Brother's tonsillitis, Dad's allergy, Grandma's hearing loss. Their expertise covers a wide variety of different areas.

ENT doctors spend a long time learning to perfect their life craft. It takes five additional years of medical residency after four years of medical school to be eligible for board certification. Once an individual has completed their residency, he or she must then take and pass a formal written exam and oral examination to be considered "board-certified". ENTs are accredited or "certified" by the American Board of Otolaryngology. In the United States, they are also part a large and powerful medical society known as the American Society of Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery or AAO-HNS.