To consider the question: How strong is the evidence in favour of yttrium synovectomy in chronic knee arthritis in patients with rheumatoid arthritis in comparison with placebo and intra-articular steroid treatment?
A systematic review of the literature was performed using Medline and the Embase database.
Initially, seven papers were identified, but only two met the inclusion criteria. Neither study showed evidence in favour of yttrium synovectomy.
From the point of view of evidence based medicine it should be seriously questioned whether yttrium synovectomy deserves a place in clinical practice.