抄録
This report describes three cases of sciatica due to unusual causes, which we recently experienced in our department. The final diagnosis were lumbar gas herniation, lumbar arachnoid cyst and lumbar adhesive arachnoiditis, which showed radicular pain of the lower limb caused by intra- or extradural compression of the lumbar and/or sacral nerve root.
Based on the patient's symptoms and neurological findings, ordinary examinations, for example myelogram, CT scanning and MR imaging, were perfomed, but definite diagnosis was not obtained. Therefore, nerve root infiltration and thiopenton pain study were added in the second and the third cases in order to get more positive evidence. The diagnosis was finally confirmed by surgical exploration and postoperative recovery.
Through this experience we would emphasize that a nerve root infiltration is useful in determining the involved nerve root which create lumbar radicular pain and a thiopenton pain study is also useful in assessing psychogenic involement in the symptoms.
