Vol. 8, Issue 1 (2022)

Material and Method: In this prospective study, 104 patients with leg and back pain associated with disc herniation underwent PELDA. The patients were divided into two groups: unfavorable and favorable. Patients were defined as having unfavorable outcomes if the percentage improvement of back pain <50% or the postoperative Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) >20% at postoperative 12 months. The preoperative demo-graphic, clinical, and radiologic factors for each group were statistically analyzed.

Results: 104 patients were enrolled in this study. The mean visual analog scale scores for back pain and the ODI scores significantly improved from 6.6 and 55.9% preoperatively to 2.5 and 12.7% at the 12 month follow-up. The surgical satisfaction rate was 78.4% at the final follow-up. Eighteen (34.6%) patients had unfavorable outcomes. Patients with advanced disc degeneration of operative levels had significantly worse outcomes than those with mild disc degeneration (odds ratio: 6.316, 95% confidence interval 1.25–31.86, P<0.05). The severity of postoperative back pain was negatively correlated with surgical satisfaction (correlation coefficient: -0.564).

Conclusion: PELDA can relieve back pain as well as leg pain through direct decompression and thermal ablation of the annular defect. Disc degeneration can be expected to influence clinical outcomes following PELDA.