The therapeutic management of back pain with and without sciatica in the emergency department: a systematic review
Three articles on PainSci cite Ashbrook 2020: 1. How to Treat Sciatic Nerve Pain 2. The Complete Guide to Low Back Pain 3. The Science of Pain-Killers
original abstract †Abstracts here may not perfectly match originals, for a variety of technical and practical reasons. Some abstacts are truncated for my purposes here, if they are particularly long-winded and unhelpful. I occasionally add clarifying notes. And I make some minor corrections.
INTRODUCTION: An increasing number of patients are attending the Emergency Department (ED) with back pain with or without sciatica. There is evidence to suggest that medical management is varied and inconsistent.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to review the literature to determine the evidence base for the therapeutic management of adults presenting with back pain with or without sciatica in the ED.
METHODS: A systematic review of the literature included the therapeutic management of patients presenting in the ED. Articles published in peer review journals in English language up to August 2018 were searched for in the following data-bases: MEDLINE, EMBASE, SCOPUS, CINAHL, ZETOC, PubMed, The Cochrane Library (Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews), Web of Science, Open Grey and ETHOS. A narrative synthesis approach was followed.
RESULTS: Twenty two studies, including 17 randomised control trials, one randomised control pilot study, two cohort studies, one cohort pilot study and one retrospective audit were included. The Downs and Black methodological quality scores ranged from 16 to 31 with a mean score of 24 out of a possible 32.
CONCLUSION: Evidence suggests that Naproxen alone should be considered as first line management in cases of back pain without sciatica. Intravenous corticosteroids should be considered in the management of cases of severe sciatica. More high quality trials are needed to determine an evidence-based management protocol for the treatment of acute low back pain in the ED, specifically focusing on non-pharmacological management and the first line management of patients presenting with LBP with sciatica.
This page is part of the PainScience BIBLIOGRAPHY, which contains plain language summaries of thousands of scientific papers & others sources. It’s like a highly specialized blog. A few highlights:
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