European spine journal : official publication of the European Spine Society, the European Spinal Deformity Society, and the European Section of the Cervical Spine Research Society
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Review Meta Analysis
Transforaminal injection of corticosteroids for lumbar radiculopathy: systematic review and meta-analysis.
Transforaminal epidural injection of steroids is used to treat lumbar radicular pain. However, there are only a few well-designed randomized, controlled studies on the effectiveness of steroid injection. ⋯ The current meta-analysis shows that transforaminal epidural steroid injections, when appropriately performed, should result in an improvement in pain, but not disability. The three RCTs that followed patients to 3 months (and the single study to 12 months) have found no benefit by the addition of steroids. The limitations of this study include the paucity of the available literature.
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Review Comparative Study
Accuracy of pedicle screw placement: a systematic review of prospective in vivo studies comparing free hand, fluoroscopy guidance and navigation techniques.
With the advances and improvement of computer-assisted surgery devices, computer-guided pedicle screws insertion has been applied to the lumbar, thoracic and cervical spine. The purpose of the present study was to perform a systematic review of all available prospective evidence regarding pedicle screw insertion techniques in the thoracic and lumbar human spine. ⋯ In conclusion, navigation does indeed exhibit higher accuracy and increased safety in pedicle screw placement than free-hand technique and use of fluoroscopy.
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In low back pain if serious pathology is suspected diagnostic imaging could be performed. One of the imaging techniques available for this purpose is computed tomography (CT), however, insight in the diagnostic performance of CT is unclear. ⋯ We found no studies evaluating the accuracy of CT for pathologies such as vertebral cancer, infection and fractures and this remains unclear. Our results should be interpreted with some caution. Sensitivity and specificity, regarding the detection of lumbar disc herniation, showed that a substantial part of the patients is still classified as false-negative and false-positive. In future, the diagnostic performance of CT must be assessed in high quality prospective cohort studies with an unselected population of patients with low back pain.
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In about 5% of all cases LBP is associated with serious underlying pathology requiring diagnostic confirmation and directed treatment. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is often used for this diagnostic purpose yet its role remains controversial. Consequently, this review aimed to summarize the available evidence on the diagnostic accuracy of MRI for identifying lumbar spinal pathology in adult low back pain (LPB) or sciatica patients. ⋯ The results suggest that a considerable proportion of patients may be classified incorrectly by MRI for HNP and spinal stenosis. However, the evidence for the diagnostic accuracy of MRI found by this review is not conclusive, since the results could be distorted due to the limited number of studies and large heterogeneity.