3. Results
Pain, Oswestry Disability, anxiety/depression, pain, Oswestry disability, sciatica, NRS
Four hundred seventy patients were included in the statistical processing. Three hundred nineteen patients underwent TFED and 86 patients ILED with a 1-year follow-up (Fig. Descriptive characteristics of the group of examined patients.Comparing the parameters: ODI index, NRS, and EQ-VAS before the operation and 12 months after the operation showed a significant improvement in the reduction of back pain, painful lower limbs, as well as significant changes in the evaluated questionnaires Evaluation of and Oswestry disability index, EQ-VAS, and pain intensity in the lower back and lower limbs according to the NRS in patients before surgery and 12 months after endoscopic discectomy.CI = confidence interval, NRS = numerical rating scale, SD = standard deviation.After 12 months, the median values for both groups in terms of back and leg pain dropped to 2, as shown in the box plots in Figure The weights used for computing the weighted questionnaire value Q, which combines the information from all 5 dimensions of the EQ-5D-5L questionnaire.For each subject, the value Q was calculated by the formula Evaluation of patients’ scores on the Numerical Pain Scale (NRS) for lower limb and back pain, before treatment, and 12 months after treatment.Evaluation of patients’ scores of Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) and overall health score (EQ-VAS) before treatment, and 12 months after treatment. Numerical scale (0–100) of ODI and EQ-VAS before the procedure and at the 1-year follow-up.We formally evaluated the efficacy of endoscopic discectomy treatment in patients with sciatica. To do this, we tested statistical hypotheses about the equality of medians in the probability distributions of questionnaire responses in the patient groups against prespecified 1-sided alternative hypotheses. The alternative hypotheses stated that the distribution of response scores in the posttreatment group is stochastically smaller and has better quality-of-life measures than the distribution of response scores in the pretreatment group in terms of mobility, self-care, everyday activities, pain/discomfort, and anxiety/depression as defined in the 5-dimensional questionnaire EQ-5D-5L. Alternatively, we estimated the corresponding values of the reliability parameters along with the associated 2-sided 95% CIs. Alternatively, we estimated the corresponding values of the reliability parameters along with the associated 2-sided 95% CIs. As a summary measure, we also considered the combined (weighted) questionnaire responses using a carefully determined weighting. In particular, for each subject the combined value Table Calculated Calculated 