The retropharyngeal steroid use during operation on the fusion rate and dysphagia after ACDF? A systematic review and meta-analysis

The aim of this meta-analysis was to investigate the effects of retropharyngeal steroid use during operation on bony fusion and dysphagia rate after ACDF. We searched the electronic literature database of PubMed, Embase and the Cochrane Library published from January 1990 to February 2020. The size of each group, mean age, proportion of female patients, dysphagia events and fusion rate at one-year follow-up were extracted. RevMan 5.3 was used for the meta-analysis. A total of eight studies including six RCTs and two case–control studies met the inclusion criteria. This meta-analysis showed that retropharyngeal steroids could achieve significantly lower dysphagia rates (p