Cryotherapy

Cryotherapy is applicable in case of chronic back pain, which is due to disorders of the small vertebral joints, not radiating to the legs and after conservative therapies have been used without satisfying results.

This major chronic pain can be caused by arthrosis of the small vertebral joints, reactions on inflammation and instability, leading to an increased sensitivity to pressure in the lumbar spine area.

The vertebral joint capsules are nerved by many facet joint nerves, transferring the pain centrally. Cryotherapy is aimed at interrupting the transfer of the joint capsule pain by eliminating the pain fibres.

Prior to this therapy, we will check by means of at least two injections, if the pain can be eased by means of anaesthetics, since only 15 % of pack pain symptoms are caused solely by facet joint problems.

The so-called “percutaneous cryo-deactivation of the nerve”
is a minimum-invasive method of pain treatment, used for the following conditions:

• Degenerative symptoms of the vertebral joints
  (e.g. arthrosis of facet joint capsules)
• Therapy-resistant pain of the facet joints

Procedure

Cryotherapy is applied on an ambulatory basis, monitored by imaging techniques. After the treatment, the patients can immediately get up without any longer disability due to the therapy.

By means of a cryo probe, the cold is introduced to the peripheral nerves of the joint capsules (–50 °C at the probe tip), thus icing and permanently anaesthetise only the myelin sheat, but not the nerve tissue. Iced nerve fibres will regenerate, thus reducing the effect to a period of 6 – 18 months approximately. If needed, cryotherapy can be applied several times.

Normally, cryotherapy is applied at different locations, since in most cases more than one joint is affected.

Cryotherapy is well-tolerated, since no further medication is required. Furthermore, the treatment is almost complication free without causing any pain. Under optimum conditions, the initial pain can be reduced by up to 90 %.