Trial reportRegional anesthesia and pain medicine2023
Patient-centered results from a multicenter study of continuous peripheral nerve blocks and postamputation phantom and residual limb pain: secondary outcomes from a randomized, clinical trial.
Trial report in Regional anesthesia and pain medicine, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT01824082 (Treating Intractable Post-Amputation Phantom Limb Pain With Ambulatory Continuous Peripheral Nerve Blocks), which is not on this map. Cited by 5 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Treating Intractable Post-Amputation Phantom Limb Pain With Ambulatory Continuous Peripheral Nerve Blocks
Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 16 citations in OpenAlex.
- [Systematic review of the effectiveness of local anaesthetics in the treatment of neuropathic pain or phantom pain].Die Anaesthesiologie · 2025Pooled it
- Effective Interventions in Restoring Mobility and Relieving Pain After Lower Limb Amputation.Journal of orthopaedics and sports medicine · 2026Article
- Phantom Limb Pain Management.The Journal of hand surgery · 2025Review
- Radiofrequency and Cryoneurolysis in Pain Management: Development, Technique, and Application.Pain research & management · 2025Review
- Enhancing Pain Management and Psychological Recovery in Earthquake Victims: The Role of Continuous Regional Analgesic Techniques Assessed by QoR-15.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
15 authors at 7 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
introductionWe previously reported that a 6-day continuous peripheral nerve block reduces established postamputation phantom pain. To provide patients and providers with the information to best inform treatment decisions, here we reanalyze the data and present the results in a more patient-centered format. We also provide information on patient-defined clinically relevant benefits to facilitate evaluation of available studies and guide future trial design.
methodsThe original trial enrolled participants with a limb amputation and phantom pain who were randomized to receive a 6-day continuous peripheral nerve block(s) of either ropivacaine (n=71) or saline (n=73) in a double-masked fashion. Here we calculate the percentage of each treatment group that experienced a clinically relevant improvement as defined by previous studies as well as present what the participants of our study defined as small, medium, and large analgesic improvements using the 7-point ordinal Patient Global Impression of Change scale.
resultsAmong patients who were given a 6-day ropivacaine infusion, 57% experienced at least a 2-point improvement on the 11-point numeric rating scale in their average and worst phantom pain 4 weeks postbaseline as compared with 26% (p<0.001) for average and 25% (p<0.001) for worst pain in patients given a placebo infusion. At 4 weeks, the percentage of participants rating their pain as improved was 53% for the active vs 30% for the placebo groups (95% CI 1.7 (1.1, 2.7), p
conclusionsAmong patients with postamputation phantom pain, a continuous peripheral nerve block more than doubles the chance of a clinically relevant improvement in pain intensity. Amputees with phantom and/or residual limb pain rate analgesic improvements as clinically relevant similarly to other chronic pain etiologies, although their smallest relevant improvement in the Brief Pain Inventory was significantly larger than previously published values. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NCT01824082.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.