Featured Review: Vertebroplasty for treating spinal fractures due to osteoporosis

High quality evidence shows that vertebroplasty does not provide more clinically important benefits than placebo but may cause people harm.Osteoporosis is characterised by thin, fragile bones and may result in minimal trauma fractures of the spine bones (vertebrae). They can cause severe pain and disability. Vertebroplasty involves injecting medical-grade cement into a fractured vertebra through a needle, under light sedation or general anaesthesia. The cement hardens in the bone space to form an internal cast. This procedure has been widely used to treat osteoporotic vertebral fractures, although two placebo-controlled trials published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2009 found that the benefits were no greater than placebo. Since then three further placebo-controlled trials have been completed that limited inclusion to people with symptoms up to only 6 or 8 weeks.A team of Cochrane authors based in Australia, Canada, and the United States worked withCochrane Musculoskeletal to update the 2015Cochrane Review on available evidence of the benefits and harms of vertebroplasty for the treatment of osteoporotic vertebral fractures. Studies compared vertebroplasty versus placebo (no cement injected) (five studies, 541 participants); usual care (eight studies, 1136 participants); kyphoplasty (similar but before the cement is injected a balloon is expanded in the fractured vertebra; seven studies, 968 participants); and facet joint steroid injection (one study, 217 partici...
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