Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2017. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jan 21, 2017; 23(3): 533-539
Published online Jan 21, 2017. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v23.i3.533
Efficacy and safety of stellate ganglion block in chronic ulcerative colitis
Hong-Ying Zhao, Guo-Tao Yang, Ning-Ning Sun, Yu Kong, Yun-Feng Liu
Hong-Ying Zhao, Yun-Feng Liu, Department of Elderly Internal Medicine, Cangzhou Central Hospital, Cangzhou Clinical Medical School of Hebei Medical University, Cangzhou 061001, Hebei Province, China
Guo-Tao Yang, Department of Third Neurology, Cangzhou Central Hospital, Cangzhou Clinical Medical School of Hebei Medical University, Cangzhou 061001, Hebei Province, China
Ning-Ning Sun, Department of First Digestion, Cangzhou Central Hospital, Cangzhou Clinical Medical School of Hebei Medical University, Cangzhou 061001, Hebei Province, China
Yu Kong, Department of Second Digestion, Cangzhou Central Hospital, Cangzhou Clinical Medical School of Hebei Medical University, Cangzhou 061001, Hebei Province, China
Author contributions: Zhao HY performed the majority of experiments; Zhao HY, Yang GT, Kong Y and Liu YF provided vital reagents and analytical tools and were also involved in editing the manuscript; Zhao HY, Yang GT and Sun NN provided the collection of all the human material in addition to providing financial support for this work; Zhao HY, Yang GT designed the study and wrote the manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by the Cangzhou Central Hospital, Cangzhou Clinical Medical School of Hebei Medical University Institutional review board.
Informed consent statement: All study participants, or their legal guardian, provided informed written consent prior to study enrollment.
Conflict-of-interest statement: No potential conflicts of interest relevant to this article were reported.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dr. Hong-Ying Zhao, Department of Elderly Internal Medicine, Cangzhou Central Hospital, Cangzhou Clinical Medical School of Hebei Medical University, 16 Xinhua West Road, Cangzhou 061001, Hebei Province, China. zhaonghongying123@21cn.com
Telephone: +86-317-2075540
Received: August 25, 2016
Peer-review started: August 25, 2016
First decision: September 12, 2016
Revised: October 18, 2016
Accepted: November 15, 2016
Article in press: November 16, 2016
Published online: January 21, 2017
Abstract
AIM

To investigate the efficacy and safety of stellate ganglion block for the treatment of patients with chronic ulcerative colitis.

METHODS

A total of 120 randomly selected patients with chronic ulcerative colitis treated in Cangzhou Central Hospital from January 2014 to January 2016 were included in this study. These patients were divided into two groups: control group (n = 30), patients received oral sulfasalazine treatment; experimental group (n = 90), patients received stellate ganglion block treatment. Clinical symptoms and disease activity in these two groups were compared before and after treatment using endoscopy. Blood was collected from patients on day 0, 10, 20 and 30 after treatment. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was performed to determine interleukin-8 (IL-8) level. The changes in IL-8 level post-treatment in the two groups were compared using repeated measures analysis of variance.

RESULTS

After treatment, clinical symptoms and disease activity were shown to be alleviated by endoscopy in both the control and experimental groups. However, patients in the control group did not have obvious abdominal pain relief. In addition, the degree of pain relief in the experimental group was statistically better than that in the control group (P < 0.05). Ten days after treatment, IL-8 level was found to be significantly lower in the experimental group than in the control group, and the difference was statistically significant (P < 0.05). In addition, adverse events were significantly higher in the control group than in the experimental group, and the difference was statistically significant (χ2 = 33.215, P = 0.000).

CONCLUSION

The application of stellate ganglion block effectively improves treatment efficacy in chronic ulcerative colitis, relieves clinical symptoms in patients, and reduces the level of inflammatory factors. Furthermore, this approach also had a positive impact on the disease to a certain extent.

Keywords: Stellate ganglion block, Chronic ulcerative colitis

Core tip: A total of 120 patients with chronic ulcerative colitis were included in this study to examine the efficacy and safety of stellate ganglion block in patients with chronic ulcerative colitis. The results revealed that stellate ganglion block effectively improves the efficacy of chronic ulcerative colitis treatment, relieves clinical symptoms in patients, and reduces the level of inflammatory factors. Furthermore, this technique has fewer adverse reactions, making it safe and reliable.