While several clinical trials have found that ultrasound guidance provides similar accuracy to fluoroscopy and reduces performance times for cervical medial branch blocks, larger studies documenting safety-related outcomes are lacking. In addition, although cervical medial branch blocks are an accepted tool to diagnose neck pain originating from the cervical facets, there are reports of long-lasting analgesic effects in a subset of patients, suggesting that these blocks may have long-term benefits. We therefore propose to prospectively examine the incidence of adverse events, as well as the clinical long-term effects of ultrasound-guided cervical medial branch blocks, in a cohort of pain clinic patients undergoing these procedures as part of their usual care.
In this study we will prospectively examine the safety and clinical effects of ultrasound-guided cervical medial branch blocks.