Management of adults with primary frozen shoulder in secondary care (UK FROST): a multicentre, pragmatic, three-arm, superiority randomised clinical trial
Authors: Amar Rangan, Stephen D Brealey, Ada Keding, Belen Corbacho, Matthew Northgraves, Lucksy Kottam, Lorna Goodchild, Cynthia Srikesavan, Saleema Rex, Charalambos P Charalambous, Nigel Hanchard, Alison Armstrong, Andrew Brooksbank, Andrew Carr, Cushla Cooper, Joseph J Dias, Iona Donnelly, Catherine Hewitt, Sarah E Lamb, Catriona McDaid, Gerry Richardson, Sara Rodgers, Emma Sharp, Sally Spencer, David Torgerson, Francine Toye, Philip Ahrens, Cheryl Baldwick, Amit Bidwai, Asim Butt, Jamie Candal-Couto, Charalambos Charalambous, Mark Crowther, Steve Drew, Sunil Garg, Richard Hawken, Cormac Kelly, Matthew Kent, Kapil Kumar, Tom Lawrence, Christopher Little, Iain Macleod, Jodi George Malal, Tim Matthews, Damian McClelland, Neal Millar, Prabhakar Motkur, Rajesh Nanda, Chris Peach Peach, Tim Peckham, Jayanti Rai, Ravi Ray, Douglas Robinson, Philip Rosell, Adam Ruman, Adnan Saithna, Colin Senior, Harish Shanker, Barnaby Sheridan, Kanthan Theivendran, Simon Thomas, Balachandran Venateswaran
Journal: The Lancet (2020)

BackgroundManipulation under anaesthesia and arthroscopic capsular release are costly and invasive treatments for frozen shoulder, but their effectiveness remains uncertain. We compared these two surgical interventions with early structured physiotherapy plus steroid injection.MethodsIn this multicentre, pragmatic, three-arm, superiority randomised trial, patients referred to secondary care for treatment of primary frozen shoulder were recruited from 35 hospital sites in the UK. Participants were adults (≥18 years) with unilateral frozen shoulder, characterised by restriction of passive external rotation (≥50%) in the affected shoulder. Participants were randomly assigned (2:2:1) to receive manipulation under anaesthesia, arthroscopic capsular release, or early structured physiotherapy. In manipulation under anaesthesia, the surgeon manipulated the affected shoulder to stretch and tear the tight capsule while the participant was under general anaesthesia, supplemented by a steroid injection. Arthroscopic capsular release, also done under general anaesthesia, involved surgically dividing the contracted anterior capsule in the rotator interval, followed by manipulation, with optional steroid injection. Both forms of surgery were followed by postprocedural physiotherapy. Early structured physiotherapy involved mobilisation techniques and a graduated home exercise programme supplemented by a steroid injection. Both early structured physiotherapy and postprocedural physiotherapy involved 12 sessions during up to 12 weeks. The primary outcome was the Oxford Shoulder Score (OSS; 0–48) at 12 months after randomisation, analysed by initial randomisation group. We sought a target difference of 5 OSS points between physiotherapy and either form of surgery, or 4 points between manipulation and capsular release. The trial registration is ISRCTN48804508.FindingsBetween April 1, 2015, and Dec 31, 2017, we screened 914 patients, of whom 503 (55%) were randomly assigned. At 12 months, OSS data were available for 189 (94%) of 201 participants assigned to manipulation (mean estimate 38·3 points, 95% CI 36·9 to 39·7), 191 (94%) of 203 participants assigned to capsular release (40·3 points, 38·9 to 41·7), and 93 (94%) of 99 participants assigned to physiotherapy (37·2 points, 35·3 to 39·2). The mean group differences were 2·01 points (0·10 to 3·91) between the capsular release and manipulation groups, 3·06 points (0·71 to 5·41) between capsular release and physiotherapy, and 1·05 points (–1·28 to 3·39) between manipulation and physiotherapy. Eight serious adverse events were reported with capsular release and two with manipulation. At a willingness-to-pay threshold of £20 000 per quality-adjusted life-year, manipulation under anaesthesia had the highest probability of being cost-effective (0·8632, compared with 0·1366 for physiotherapy and 0·0002 for capsular release).InterpretationAll mean differences on the assessment of shoulder pain and function (OSS) at the primary endpoint of 12 months were less than the target differences. Therefore, none of the three interventions were clinically superior. Arthoscopic capsular release carried higher risks, and manipulation under anaesthesia was the most cost-effective.FundingThe National Institute for Health Research Health Technology Assessment programme.