Comparative safety and efficacy of three different ultrasound guided approaches to lumbar dorsal rami for pain relief in adults undergoing lumbar spine surgery – a double blind randomized controlled non-inferiority trial.

Lumbar spine surgery is often associated with severe pain in the perioperative period. Several regional analgesia techniques have been found to be effective in the management of pain in these group of patients [1]. Erector spinae plane block (ESPB) and thoracolumbar interfascial plane block (TLIP) are established regional approaches for effective pain management with reduction in pain scores and opioid consumption [2, 3]. Similarly, lumbar submultifidus muscle block has been introduced recently as a novel regional analgesia technique. This involves instillation of local anaesthetics below the lumbar multifidus muscle to block pain conduction through dorsal rami providing acceptable analgesia following lumbar spine surgery [4]. However, scarce information is available on the comparative safety and efficacy of these approaches for post-operative analgesia for lumbar spine surgery, hence we planned this randomized controlled trial.  

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