A Pragmatic Randomised Prospective Multi-centre Non-inferiority Trial in Chronic Pain Patients With Closed-loop Spinal Cord Stimulation (CL-SCS) to Compare the Clinical Effectiveness and Cost Utility of an All-in-one Procedure With an At-home Screening Trial

In 2019, the Dutch Healthcare Institute published a consensus report outlining when spinal cord stimulation (SCS) for chronic pain qualifies for reimbursement under Dutch health insurance. It mandates that adult patients with significant pain (VAS ≥50mm or NRS ≥5) undergo an at-home screening trial, which must show at least 50% pain reduction to proceed with permanent implantation. Screening trials give patients early access to the therapy, but they are expensive, often redundant, and pose risks such as infection. A recent UK study (TRIAL-STIM) found no significant difference in outcomes between patients who had screening trials and those who received an all-in-one SCS procedure, but the trial strategy incurred greater costs. Given these findings, and the fact that all-in-one procedures are already used in certain Dutch cases, it is reasonable to evaluate this approach more broadly. Therefore, a pragmatic, multi-centre, randomized non-inferiority trial will compare the effectiveness of the all-in-one procedure, no trial group (NTG) to the standard two-step approach, trial group (TG) in Dutch patients with chronic neuropathic pain.