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Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials

Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) has emerged as a popular intervention for chronic pain management, including pain originating in the sacroiliac joint. It offers a less invasive option than surgery but with better results than the previous standard treatment with steroid and anesthetic injections. Proc...

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Autores principales: Lowe, Michael, Okunlola, Oluwasemilore, Raza, Shafaat, Osasan, Stephen A, Sethia, Sudiksha, Batool, Tayyaba, Bambhroliya, Zarna, Sandrugu, Joel, Hamid, Pousette
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Cureus 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9311336/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35911275
http://dx.doi.org/10.7759/cureus.26327
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author Lowe, Michael
Okunlola, Oluwasemilore
Raza, Shafaat
Osasan, Stephen A
Sethia, Sudiksha
Batool, Tayyaba
Bambhroliya, Zarna
Sandrugu, Joel
Hamid, Pousette
author_facet Lowe, Michael
Okunlola, Oluwasemilore
Raza, Shafaat
Osasan, Stephen A
Sethia, Sudiksha
Batool, Tayyaba
Bambhroliya, Zarna
Sandrugu, Joel
Hamid, Pousette
author_sort Lowe, Michael
collection PubMed
description Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) has emerged as a popular intervention for chronic pain management, including pain originating in the sacroiliac joint. It offers a less invasive option than surgery but with better results than the previous standard treatment with steroid and anesthetic injections. Procedure volumes have enjoyed significant growth in the market in recent years. The evidence supporting this intervention, in the form of randomized controlled trials, however, is both thin and mixed. The purpose of this systematic review is to evaluate the body of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to determine the quality of support for and against the use of radiofrequency ablation to treat sacroiliac joint (SIJ) pain. Several important new papers have emerged since previous systematic reviews with similar objectives were published. The review was conducted according to PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines, and three databases were used: PubMed, Google Scholar, and Scopus. Only RCTs were sought, and no other filters, such as a historical timeline cut-off, were used. Among 95 publications that returned in response to the query, 16 were ultimately accepted as meeting the inclusion/exclusion criteria. The Cochrane risk-of-bias tool was utilized as a quality assessment measure, and the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations) framework was used to assess the certainty of the evidence. Among the included publications, 15 out of 16 publications featured positive results and conclusions that supported the use of RFA in treating chronic sacroiliac joint pain. The single negative study was also the largest trial (n=681), but it was identified as “High Risk” using the Cochrane risk-of-bias tool. It included several design flaws including neither operator nor patient blinding, missing information, use of inconsistent treatment modalities across groups, and disproportionate drop-out rates. Despite its flaws, we have included this study in the present review because of its sheer size. Taken in aggregate, the total body of research included in this review supports this intervention. Questions continue to exist around whether there are clinically significant benefits associated with different RFA modalities (for example, unipolar vs. bipolar), with convincing evidence supporting each of them. Finally, it can be concluded that while the benefits are reasonably and justifiably supported in this patient population for up to one year, there is a dearth of evidence beyond a 12-month post-intervention follow-up.
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spelling pubmed-93113362022-07-29 Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials Lowe, Michael Okunlola, Oluwasemilore Raza, Shafaat Osasan, Stephen A Sethia, Sudiksha Batool, Tayyaba Bambhroliya, Zarna Sandrugu, Joel Hamid, Pousette Cureus Anesthesiology Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) has emerged as a popular intervention for chronic pain management, including pain originating in the sacroiliac joint. It offers a less invasive option than surgery but with better results than the previous standard treatment with steroid and anesthetic injections. Procedure volumes have enjoyed significant growth in the market in recent years. The evidence supporting this intervention, in the form of randomized controlled trials, however, is both thin and mixed. The purpose of this systematic review is to evaluate the body of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to determine the quality of support for and against the use of radiofrequency ablation to treat sacroiliac joint (SIJ) pain. Several important new papers have emerged since previous systematic reviews with similar objectives were published. The review was conducted according to PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines, and three databases were used: PubMed, Google Scholar, and Scopus. Only RCTs were sought, and no other filters, such as a historical timeline cut-off, were used. Among 95 publications that returned in response to the query, 16 were ultimately accepted as meeting the inclusion/exclusion criteria. The Cochrane risk-of-bias tool was utilized as a quality assessment measure, and the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations) framework was used to assess the certainty of the evidence. Among the included publications, 15 out of 16 publications featured positive results and conclusions that supported the use of RFA in treating chronic sacroiliac joint pain. The single negative study was also the largest trial (n=681), but it was identified as “High Risk” using the Cochrane risk-of-bias tool. It included several design flaws including neither operator nor patient blinding, missing information, use of inconsistent treatment modalities across groups, and disproportionate drop-out rates. Despite its flaws, we have included this study in the present review because of its sheer size. Taken in aggregate, the total body of research included in this review supports this intervention. Questions continue to exist around whether there are clinically significant benefits associated with different RFA modalities (for example, unipolar vs. bipolar), with convincing evidence supporting each of them. Finally, it can be concluded that while the benefits are reasonably and justifiably supported in this patient population for up to one year, there is a dearth of evidence beyond a 12-month post-intervention follow-up. Cureus 2022-06-25 /pmc/articles/PMC9311336/ /pubmed/35911275 http://dx.doi.org/10.7759/cureus.26327 Text en Copyright © 2022, Lowe et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Anesthesiology
Lowe, Michael
Okunlola, Oluwasemilore
Raza, Shafaat
Osasan, Stephen A
Sethia, Sudiksha
Batool, Tayyaba
Bambhroliya, Zarna
Sandrugu, Joel
Hamid, Pousette
Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials
title Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials
title_full Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials
title_fullStr Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials
title_full_unstemmed Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials
title_short Radiofrequency Ablation as an Effective Long-Term Treatment for Chronic Sacroiliac Joint Pain: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials
title_sort radiofrequency ablation as an effective long-term treatment for chronic sacroiliac joint pain: a systematic review of randomized controlled trials
topic Anesthesiology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9311336/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35911275
http://dx.doi.org/10.7759/cureus.26327
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