Does Single Blind Anterior Glenohumeral Steroid Injection Performed by Short Experienced Clinicians Could Provide Clinical Efficacy in Patients with Frozen Shoulder?

Abstract

Background: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of single blinded anterior intra-articular corticosteroid injection to the glenohumeral joint performed by short experienced clinicians in frozen state adhesive capsulitis patients.Methods: From March to June of 2013, among the patients who visited the shoulder outpatient clinic due to shoulder pain for 5-6 months and those patient diagnosed as frozen state adhesive capsulitis was selected. The diagnosis were based on base, first the global limitation of range of motion, defined as forward elevation <100, external rotation at side <10, internal rotation less than buttock, and abduction <70. Second, the patients had additional radiologic evaluations showing no major pathologies for such stiffness. Clinical out-come, were performed with pain visual analog scale (PVAS) and functional visual analog scale (FVAS), American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons Shoulder score (ASES), preinjection and postinjection after 2−4 weeks. Finally 82-patients were enrolled. Mean age of the pa-tients was 55.1 years and mean follow-up duration was 25.17 days.Results: The mean preinjection PVAS was 6.91 and postinjection was 3.11, there was 3.8 decreases from preinjection status (p < 0.001). The mean FVAS score showed 4.26 at preinjection and 6.63 afterwards (p < 0.001). The ASES score showed 27.89 increases after injec-tion (p < 0.001). There were 64-patients (78.04%) who reported more than 3 points of decrease of PVAS, who could be judged as ef-fective treatment.Conclusions: Single anterior glenohumeral steroid injection by short experienced clinicians to the patients with frozen state adhesive capsulitis has shown relatively high efficacy in clinical result evaluated by means of PVAS.