Background: Peripheral nerve stimulation has been used for decades to treat chronic pain but has not been used\nfor postoperative analgesia due to multiple limitations, beginning with invasive electrode placement. With the\ndevelopment of small-diameter/gauge leads enabling percutaneous insertion, ultrasound guidance for accurate\nintroduction, and stimulators small enough to be adhered to the skin, neurostimulation may now be provided in a\nsimilar manner to continuous peripheral nerve blocks. Here, we report on the use of ultrasound-guided\npercutaneous peripheral nerve stimulation to treat postoperative pain.\nMaterials and methods: Subjects within 60 days of a total knee arthroplasty with pain insufficiently treated with\noral analgesics had a 0.2-mm-diameter electrical lead (pre-loaded into a 20 gauge needle) introduced percutaneously\nusing ultrasound guidance with the tip located approximately 0.5ââ?¬â??1.0 cm from the femoral nerve (a second lead was\ninserted approximately 1.0ââ?¬â??3.0 cm from the sciatic nerve for posterior knee pain). An external stimulator delivered\ncurrent. Endpoints were assessed before and after lead insertion and the leads subsequently removed. Due to the\nsmall sample size for this pilot/feasibility study, no statistics were applied to the data.\nResults: Leads were inserted in subjects (n = 5) 8ââ?¬â??58 days postoperatively. Percutaneous peripheral nerve stimulation\ndecreased pain an average of 93% at rest (from a mean of 5.0 to 0.2 on a 0ââ?¬â??10 numeric rating scale), with 4 of 5\nsubjects experiencing complete resolution of pain. During passive and active knee motion pain decreased an average\nof 27 and 30%, respectively. Neither maximum passive nor active knee range-of-motion was consistently affected.\nConclusions: Ultrasound-guided percutaneous peripheral nerve stimulation may be a practical modality for the\ntreatment of postoperative pain following orthopedic surgical procedures, and further investigation appears warranted.
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