COVID-19 and low back pain: previous infections lengthen recovery time after intradiscal ozone therapy in patients with herniated lumbar disc

Purpose To assess and compare the clinical effectiveness of percutaneous intradiscal ozone therapy in patients affected by lumbar disc herniation, with and without history of COVID-19 infection. Materials and Methods After the rising of COVID-19 pandemics in Italy, 47 consecutive percutaneous intradiscal ozone therapies were performed on patients with low back pain and/or sciatic pain due to lumbar disc herniation. Among these, 19 had suffered from COVID-19 and successively recovered with no residual symptoms, while the remaining 28 had not previously been affected by COVID-19 and were not convalescent. Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) was administered before the treatment and at 1-month and 3-month follow-up in order to assess the clinical outcome. Results The two groups were similar in terms of patient age (p-value 0.54), treated levels (p-value 0.26) and pre-procedure ODI (p-value 0.33). Technical success was achieved in all cases. In patients previously affected by COVID-19, mean ODI decrease was 11.58 +/- 9.51 (35.72%) at 1-month follow-up and 20.63 +/- 9.87 (63.63%) at 3-month follow-up. In patients never affected by COVID-19, mean ODI decrease was 20.93 +/- 10.53 (58.73%) at 1-month follow-up and 22.07 +/- 11.36 (61.92%) at 3-month follow-up. Eventually, clinical success was registered in 84.21% (16/19) of patients with history of COVID-19 infection and in 85.71% (24/28) of patients with no history of COVID-19 infection. No major complication was registered. Conclusions In case of lumbar disc herniation treated with percutaneous intradiscal ozone therapy, patients previously affected by COVID-19 showed a significantly longer recovery time.