Clinical therapeutic effects of pulsed-radiofrequency combined with blockade in the treatment of patients with chronic migraine: A protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: Recently, researchers have emphasised on the clinical therapeutic effects of pulsed-radiofrequency combined with blockade to treat chronic migraine (CM) patients. However, there are controversial results. Therefore, the authors conduct the proposed research to assess the efficacy of pulsed-radiofrequency combined with blockade to teat CM patients. METHODS: The authors will perform a comprehensive literature search on the following online-based databases from establishment till October 2021: Web of Science, EMBASE, PubMed, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, the Cochrane library, and WanFang database. We will consider all randomized controlled trials of pulsed-radiofrequency combined with blockade for CM for inclusion. There won’t be any language constraints. Following the search, a pair of reviewers will independently screen and choose related articles to include in the meta-analysis. The Cochrane risk of bias tool will be used to assess the systematic value of all included randomized controlled trials. The study will utilize the risk ratio, mean differences, or standardized mean differences and their 95% confidence intervals to perform an estimation of the pooled mean effect size. Lastly, the authors will employ funnel plot, Egger test, and sensitivity analysis to determine and describe possible heterogeneity. RESULTS: The authors will publish the results in a peer-reviewed journal. CONCLUSION: The proposed study will be the first to evaluate the effectiveness of pulsed-radiofrequency combined with blockade in the treatment of patients with CM. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Since the proposed study is a systematic review of published studies, an ethics approval is not needed. REGISTRATION NUMBER: Oct 12, 2021.osf.io/d2wx3. (https://osf.io/d2wx3/).