New needle holder facilitates percutaneous fluoroscopy-guided sacroiliac puncture

Abstract

To evaluate the success of a new guidance device for sacroiliac joint puncture. The device was first tested on a human anatomical model and thereafter on two groups of patients. In the first group (n=8), the traditional hand-guided method was used, and in the second group (n=10) the needle-holder device. The parameters evaluated in each group were "the number of attempts", defined as the number of skin punctures, and "fluoroscopy-injection time", defined as the time from the beginning of the fluoroscopy to the end of the correct insertion of the needle into the joint. Sacroiliac injection with the new device required significantly fewer attempts (2.1 +/- 2 versus 4.3 +/- 3) and shorter fluoroscopy injection times (8.9 +/- 3 min versus 15 +/- 5 min; P<0.05). The new guidance device makes sacroiliac joint injection easier and prevents unnecessary exposure to radiation during the procedure.