Effects of Control Scan for Presumed Difficult Epidural Infiltrations (ECHORACHIS)

The aim of this care protocol is to study the effects of scan to help epidural infiltration realization, in presumed difficult patients suffering from sciatica.

These scans are already performed in our Rheumatology Department but our objective is to evaluate objectively its contribution for patients and doctors.

Epidural infiltration in young patients, with an easy anatomical identification, causes generally no technical difficulties, therefore this protocol will only include patients presumed to have a difficult infiltration, that means those aged more than 60, and/or with BMI > 30 and/or suffering from scoliosis.

This study concerns patients who are hospitalized in Rheumatology Department (Hospital of Nantes) for their first epidural infiltration for treatment-resistant lombosciatica.

Patient will be randomized at Day 0, before infiltration. This latter will be performed in accordance to current practice.

Tolerance data (pain and satisfaction) will be collected just after the infiltration and eventual complications will be reported within 48 hours after infiltration.

Following treatment of lombosciatic will be realized through hospitalization, as usual.

Scan is a safe, non invasive, painless and non radiating exam. It is the extension of the musculoskeletal clinical exam and it has already changed our rheumatology practices. The investigators hope at the end of this study, that results would confirm that scan can be a help in practice to perform epidural infiltrations.