For patients with radicular pain unresponsive to conservative treatment after 1-2 months and no progressive neurologic deficit, epidural corticosteroid injections are often tried before surgical intervention.

CLINICAL STUDIES — Published studies of corticosteroid injections for radiculopathy have usually been small and short-term, used various corticosteroids in different doses and fluid volumes, included and excluded patients with various etiologies, and used a variety of endpoints to measure outcomes. Some studies used placebo controls; most did not. A few studies were randomized; none were double-blind.

Lumbar Radiculopathy – One review found strong evidence that use of lumbar epidural steroid injections produced short-term relief of unilateral radicular pain caused by herniated nucleus pulposus or spinal stenosis.1 A review of studies using only ... more      

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