Background: Trigger finger, a common condition of finger, is characterized by pain, clicking, catching, or loss of motion of the affected finger. The symptoms are attributed to inflammation and subsequent narrowing of the A1 pulley. Percutaneous release of A1 pulley has shown good success rate and has been an efficient, cost effective and safe alternative to open release for the management of trigger digits. Whether adding steroid injection concomitantly to this time-tested procedure has any advantage is not well established. This study is designed to compare the outcomes of percutaneous release with and without concomitant steroid injection in terms of pain, recurrence and complications.

Method: This prospective comparative study included 68 patients of age 18 years or older presenting with trigger thumb (Green’s type II, III, and IV). They were allocated into two groups. Patients in group A underwent percutaneous release only whereas those in group B underwent percutaneous release with concomitant steroid injection. Both the groups were followed up for one month and studied in terms of patient demographics, pain, recurrence, complication and patient satisfaction.

Result: Out of the 68 patients that underwent this study, 38 (55.90%) were female and 30 (44.1%) were male with mean age of 52.87 years. At the end of final follow up, 94.12% patients in Group A and 97.06% patients in Group B had satisfactory outcome (p=0.55).

Conclusion: There is no significant difference in outcome between percutaneous release with or without concomitant steroid injection in the treatment of trigger digits.

Keywords: Annular pulley, Green’s grading, Percutaneous release, Steroid injection, Trigger digit