Effect of Epidural Pulsed Radiofrequency with Neuro-Stimulation in Management of Thoracic Spinal Cord Injury

Abstract

Background: Patients with spinal cord injury suffering from functional disability and reduced quality of life, in addition to conventional managements, many spinal cord researches try to develop effective repair treatment which can restore sensory and motor function to near-normal values, one of these new strategies is the neuromodulation Objective: we aim to show the effect of spinal cord stimulation with epidural radiofrequency on improvement of trunk stability, mobility, standing, postural control, and assisted walking which will increase performance in activities of daily living (ADLs) . Patients and Methods: we randomized 37 of chronic thoracic (T4_T10) spinal cord injuries of ASIA Impairment scale grade A(completes SCI) who are under conventional rehabilitation treatment to receive epidural pulsed radiofrequency and spinal cord stimulation and follow the improvement of sensory , motor function, trunk stability, assisted walk, and performance in activities of daily livings (ADLs) using ASIA impairment scale, modified functional reaching test, functional ambulation category scale and Barthel index respectively. Results: there were improvements of sense-motor function, trunk stability, assisted walk, performance function and quality of life after one year of treatment. Conclusion: epidural pulsed radiofrequency and spinal neuro-stimulation combined with the conventional rehabilitation treatment showed significant advantage in improvement of neural activity, performance independency and quality of life.