Vertebroplasty appears no better than placebo for painful osteoporotic spinal fractures, and has potential to cause harm.

摘要

The editorial by Buch-binder et al suggesting that the effectiveness of vertebroplasty has been determined by the two studies she and her co-authors published is misleading.Both studies contain major flaws. In both, 70% of eligible patients declined to participate. No details of these patients are published, but they may have been the patients with more severe pain. The median duration of pain in the Australian study was 9 weeks (compared with 16 weeks in the US study); only 30% of patients had pain for less than 6 weeks. No information on the need for hospitalisation because of severe pain was given in either study. The average length of hospital stay was not published.