Purpose

To retrospectively evaluate the clinical and instrumental outcome of different treatment sessions of oxygen–ozone (O₂–O₃) chemodiscolysis in patients with lumbar disc herniation

Methods

We evaluated 73 patients partially responders to a single session of oxygen–ozone (O₂–O₃) chemodiscolysis and submitted to multiple injections sessions. All patients completed a pre- and post-treatment clinical (VAS and modified McNab score) and instrumental MRI follow-up. Imaging evaluation included assessment of intervertebral disc area (IDA). Pre- and post-treatment differences were compared to evaluate differences in variation between groups. Correlation analysis was used to evaluate the relationship between morphological and clinical parameters.

Results

Based on the type and number of treatments performed, patients were divided into three groups: Group A) patients submitted to an additional periradicular anaesthetic/steroid injection; Group B) patients submitted to an additional session of intradiscal O₂–O₃ injection; Group C) patients submitted to two further sessions of intradiscal O₂–O₃ injection.

The results showed an improvement of pain scores in all groups, and a smaller disc area change in group B. Comparing the differences between pre- and post-treatment features among the three different groups of patients, we did not find any statistically significant difference. Correlation analysis did not show any statistically significant correlation between the morphological changes of the intervertebral disc and the clinical output scores.

Conclusions

In our retrospective observation of partially responder patients, multiple intradiscal ozone injections were not associated with a higher disc shrinkage nor superior clinical outcome compared to a single intradiscal O₂–O₃ application with an additional periradicular injection session.

中文翻译：

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O2–O3 化学溶解：多少、多长时间？部分缓解患者不同治疗疗程的回顾性结果评估

目的

_{回顾性评估氧-臭氧（O 2} –O ₃ ）化学溶解术不同疗程治疗腰椎间盘突出症患者的临床和仪器结果

方法

我们评估了 73 名对单次氧气-臭氧 (O ₂ –O ₃ ) 化学溶解有部分反应的患者，并接受了多次注射。所有患者均完成治疗前和治疗后临床（VAS 和改良 McNab 评分）和仪器 MRI 随访。影像学评估包括椎间盘面积（IDA）评估。比较治疗前和治疗后的差异以评估组间变异的差异。使用相关分析来评估形态学和临床参数之间的关系。

结果

根据所进行的治疗类型和次数，患者被分为三组：A组）患者接受额外的根周麻醉/类固醇注射；B组）患者接受额外的椎间盘内O ₂ –O ₃注射；C组）患者接受另外两次椎间盘内O ₂ –O ₃注射。

结果显示，所有组的疼痛评分均有所改善，B组的椎间盘面积变化较小。比较三组患者治疗前和治疗后特征的差异，我们没有发现任何统计学上的显着差异。相关分析未显示椎间盘形态变化与临床输出评分之间存在任何统计学上显着的相关性。

结论

在我们对部分缓解患者的回顾性观察中，与单次椎间盘内 O 2 –O ₃应用_加额外的根周注射疗程相比，多次椎间盘内臭氧注射不会导致更高的椎间盘收缩，也不会带来更好的临床结果。