Epidural steroid injections in treatment of chronic lower back pain caused by degenerative-dystrophic spine damage

Background. The high incidence of degenerative-dystrophic spine damage with the variability of research results on the effectiveness of epidural steroid injections for treatment of chronic lower back pain is an urgent issue regarding treatment of this pain with epidural steroid injections only. Objective. The aim of the study is to improve the effectiveness of treatment of chronic lower back pain caused by degenerative spine damage with monotherapy – epidural steroid injections only. Material and methods. The early and long-term treatment outcomes with epidural steroid injections only of 120 patients with chronic lower back pain were analysed. The control group consisted of 36 patients with lower back pain treated conservatively. The results of treatment were assessed by the dynamics of pain regression using the visual analog scale (VAS), as well as the functional status by the Oswestry index. The assessment was performed three times: before treatment, after treatment and six months after it. Results. In the early post-treatment period, reliable results of treatment of chronic lower lumbar pain was evidenced in both the main and control groups. There was no significant difference in treatment outcomes between these groups in the early period, although both the Oswestry index and the VAS by the Student’s T-test showed that the differences were in favour of the main group. There was a significant difference in long-term treatment outcomes between the main and control groups both by the Oswestry index and the VAS in favour of monotherapy with epidural steroid injections. Conclusions. The study proved a high effectiveness of monotherapy with epidural steroid injections for chronic lower back pain caused by degenerative-dystrophic spine damage.