Cervical facet joint platelet-rich plasma in people with chronic whiplash-associated disorders: A prospective case series of short-term outcomes.

OBJECTIVE

To explore the safety and feasibility of a single autologous injection of platelet-rich plasma (PRP) in cervical facet joints of people with chronic WAD and facet-mediated pain, and explore the association between pain relief reported with diagnostic medial branch blocks (MBBs) and 3-months post-PRP.

DESIGN

A prospective case series of people with chronic whiplash-associated disorders and cervical facet joint mediated pain in a community setting.

INTERVENTIONS

A single autologous PRP injection was provided to cervical facet joints under ultrasound and fluoroscopic guidance.

MEASURES

Adverse events were recorded one-week, and measures of pain (numerical pain rating scale - NPRS) and disability (Neck Disability Index - NDI) were collected prior to and 3-months following cervical facet joint PRP. People not reached for follow-up were considered failures for worst-case analysis. The correlation between percentage response to diagnostic cervical medial branch blocks (MBBs) and percentage pain relief reported at 3-months was also investigated.

RESULTS

Forty-four people (82% female; mean age (SD): 45.2 (10.8) years) underwent cervical facet joint PRP. There was a significant improvement in pain and disability following PRP. Seventy percent of people exceeded MCID for pain. For NDI scores, 80% of people exceeded MCID. Forty-one percent of people reported greater than 50% relief of pain 3-months post-cervical facet joint PRP.There was no significant correlation between percentage relief of pain with cervical MBBs and percentage relief of pain 3-months post-PRP ( ​= ​0.06,  ​= ​0.73).There were no adverse events reported.

CONCLUSION

In people with chronic WAD and facet-mediated pain, preliminary data suggests that PRP is safe and it is feasible to move forwards with randomized studies to further investigate efficacy and effectiveness.