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Effect of Fluoroscopically Guided Caudal Epidural Steroid or Local Anesthetic Injections in the Treatment of Lumbar Disc Herniation and Radiculitis: A Randomized, Controlled, Double Blind Trial with a Two-Year Follow-Up Full Text
Pain Physician, 08/03/2012
Clinical Article
Manchikanti L et al. – Caudal epidural injections of local anesthetic with or without steroids might be an effective therapy for patients with disc herniation or radiculitis. The present evidence illustrates the potential superiority of steroids compared with local anesthetic at two year follow up based on average relief per procedure.
Methods- One hundred twenty patients were randomized to two groups: Group I received 10 mL caudal epidural injections of local anesthetic, lidocaine 0.5%; Group II patients received caudal epidural injections of 0.5% lidocaine, 9 mL, mixed with 1 mL of steroid.
- Multiple outcome measures were utilized.
- The primary outcome measures were Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) and the Oswestry Disability Index 2.0 (ODI).
- Secondary outcome measures were employment status and opioid intake.
- Significant pain relief improvement was defined as 50% or more improvement in NRS and ODI scores.
- In the successful category, 77% of Group I had significant pain relief of >/= 50% and functional status improvement of >/= 50% reduction in ODI scores; in Group II it was 76%, whereas overall it was 60% and 65% in Groups I and II.
- Over the two years, Group I had an average number of procedures of 5.5 ± 2.8; Group II was 5.3 ± 2.4.
- Even though there was no significant difference in overall relief between the two groups, the average relief for each procedure was superior for steroids.
