Monopolar Versus Biopolar Radiofrequency in OA Knee Pain

Chronic knee pain due to osteoarthritis (OA) is a debilitating disease. Many therapeutic options have been used to manage this pain . Although there are many pharmacological and surgical treatment options for knee osteoarthritis, these entail a number of concerns. Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs can be used for the initial management of osteoarthritis . Intra-articular corticosteroid injection is another option suggested in the guidelines for the treatment of knee osteoarthritis . Surgical procedures are generally performed in cases unresponsive to the conservative treatment options. Joint replacement is the most commonly performed surgical procedure .Genicular nerve ablation with radiofrequency (RF) has recently become a promising treatment option in the management of osteoarthritis related knee pain. In conventional monopolar radiofrequency ablation (MRFA) technique, the localisation of genicular nerves is done through sensory stimulation at the junction of epicondyle with the shaft of femur bone near periosteum. Added to this, the procedure can be distressing when during localisation of genicular nerves the RF cannula comes in contact with pain-sensitive structures such as the periosteum and ligament insertion sites . Bipolar radiofrequency ablation Two radiofrequency cannula are advanced towards the nerve. The novel idea to use bipolar RFA in this study was to produce a larger lesion, thus may minimize the chance to miss the lesion of genicular nerves. Also Placing two electrodes avoids manipulation required to localise the genicular nerves with inadvertent stimulation of pain-sensitive periosteum . So investigaters need to see experimentally if bipolar radiofrequency ablation (BRFA) near the target nerve area without manipulation for localisation of genicular nerves has the ability to reduce the procedural pain than Monopolar radiofrequency.

Inclusion criteria

• (1) outpatient clinic with osteoarthritis-character chronic knee pain, OA grades II-IV (Kellgren and Lawrence scale).

(2) Patients not responding to other treatments as physiotherapy, oral analgesics, and intraarticular injection with hyaluronic acids or steroids.

(3) Patients refused surgery. (4) Patients after failed conservative treatment for 3 months and reported more than 50% pain relief after diagnostic genicular nerve block with 2% of 2 mL lidocaine on superior lateral, superior medial and inferior medial genicular nerves.

Exclusion criteria

• Patients with acute knee pain, previous knee surgery, other connective tissue disorders affecting the knee.
• serious neurologic or psychiatric disorders, those had previously received radiofrequency ablation therapy for similar symptoms.
• contraindications for genicular nerve block or genicular nerve RF (active infection, bleeding disorders, current use of anticoagulants or antiplatelets, allergy against the drugs used during the protocol, pregnancy, cardiac pacemaker.

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