[bobthepanda]

IME septoplasty was bad for like a week (constantly nosebleeding more than I’ve ever done in my life) but in the grand scheme of surgery its a fairly low pain, fast recovery, at least compared to other ones I’ve done like ACL construction.

The ones they generally don’t recommend in the US are those that involve airway or jaw modification; they have fairly low success rates, you’ll have trouble eating for months, and they can come with a whole host of nasty side effects like permanent uncontrolled nasal drip. Plus, in general US medicine tries not to recommend major surgeries if alternatives are good enough or better, not only to reduce cost and recovery, complications etc, but also because general anesthesia itself is risky.