ReviewBrain & spine2026
Treatment outcomes for cluneal neuropathy: a systematic review and meta-analysis.
Review in Brain & spine, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Fascial Plane Blocks in Perioperative and Pain Medicine: From Mechanisms to Emerging Multitarget Interfascial Strategies.Current pain and headache reports · 2026Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Cluneal nerve entrapment is an increasingly recognized but often overlooked cause of chronic low back pain. Various treatment strategies have been described, including surgical decompression, injection therapy, radiofrequency ablation (RFA), and peripheral nerve stimulation (PNS). However, pooled evidence on treatment outcomes remains limited. Objective: This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to evaluate pooled responder rates following different treatment modalities for cluneal nerve-related pain. Methods: A systematic review and meta-analysis was performed of studies reporting dichotomous responder outcomes after treatment of superior or middle cluneal nerve entrapment. Responder status was defined as ≥50% pain reduction or study-defined clinical improvement. Random-effects meta-analysis of proportions with logit transformation was used to pool responder rates. The primary analysis included treatment arms with follow-up of ≥3 months, and a predefined sensitivity analysis was restricted to studies with follow-up of ≥6 months. Subgroup analyses were performed by treatment modality and by surgical versus non-surgical treatment strategy. Results: A total of 26 treatment arms including 628 patients were analyzed. The pooled responder rate was 78.3% (95% CI 72.9-82.9) at ≥3 months and 82.9% (95% CI 75.3-88.6) at ≥6 months. Stratified by treatment modality, pooled responder rates were 93.1% (95% CI 84.9-97.0) for surgical decompression, 72.4% (95% CI 65.9-78.1) for injection therapy, 75.1% (95% CI 62.1-84.7) for radiofrequency ablation, and 80.1% (95% CI 58.5-92.0) for peripheral nerve stimulation. Conclusion: Targeted treatment of cluneal nerve entrapment was associated with high pooled responder rates at both ≥3 and ≥ 6 months of follow-up. Surgical decompression was associated with the highest pooled responder proportion; however, differences between treatment modalities should be interpreted cautiously given the predominantly observational, non-comparative nature of the available evidence, heterogeneity in diagnostic criteria and outcome definitions, and the potential for confounding by indication. Prospective comparative studies using standardized diagnostic and outcome measures are needed.
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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.