Six-Month Results of Cervical Intradiscal Oxygen-Ozone Mixture Therapy on Patients with Neck Pain: Preliminary Findings

Numerous techniques have been developed for the treatment of disc herniation. Oxygen-ozone (O -O ) mixture therapy is a minimally invasive percutaneous treatment for disc herniation. The aim of the study is to investigate the 6-month efficacy and safety of O -O mixture therapy in patients with cervical disc herniation (CDH) and chronic neck pain. This is a cross-sectional, single-center study. The study was conducted from January 2012 to May 2016 on patients visiting Sakarya University Training and Research Hospital's pain clinic. Each patient was evaluated before the procedure (baseline) and at 2 weeks (W2), 6 weeks (W6), and 6 months (M6) after the procedure using the visual analog scale (VAS) and the Oswestry Disability Index scores. A total of 44 patients with CDH underwent the same treatment with an O -O mixture. Significant pain relief was observed compared with preoperative pain at W2, W6, and M6 according to patient self-evaluation (P = 0.01). The mean VAS score was 7.89 ± 1.13 before the procedure, 4.22 ± 1.62 at W2, 3.03 ± 1.66 at W6, and 2.27 ± 1.25 at the end of M6. No significant complications or side effects were reported during or after the procedure. Our study was conducted retrospectively, which resulted in problems obtaining follow-up data. In addition, this study was performed in a small patient group. Based on our results, intradiscal injection of an O2-O3 mixture treatment showed a beneficial long-term effect. Cervical disc herniation, chemonucleolysis, injection, intradiscal, oxygen-ozone mixture, percutaneous treatment.