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Research shows that, alteration in the acuteness of radiographic knee osteoarthritis (OA) may lead to more serious functional issues.This fact was mentioned on the online paper Arthritis Care & Research.

Data was analyzed 2110 individuals by Dr. White of Boston University School of Medicine and colleagues.The average age was mean age, 62 years in a cohort study of patients with or at high risk for knee osteoarthritis (OA).

After a 30 month followup and baseline, 53% of those under observation had no signs of knee OA on x-rays, 6% developed incident disease, 14% had stable knee OA, and 27% had worsening radiographic OA. Compared to those with no knee OA, patients with incident OA had 1.8 times the risk of walking speed impairment (during a 20 meter walk) and 1.9 times the risk of incident severe functional limitation, such as trouble climbing stairs and getting up from a chair. The researchers used Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Arthritis Index (WOMAC) scores to quantify functional ability. Compared to subjects with stable disease, those with worsening structural OA had 2.2 times greater risk of incident severe functional limitations and 2.5 times the risk of severe limitation in walking speed.

"Why are persons with worsening structural disease more likely to have severe functional limitation compared with those with stable or no disease?" the authors ask. "One possible reason why... is that they have less time to adapt to the development of these underlying impairments due to progressive disease, versus those with stable or slowly progressive disease.""Though previous literature found structural disease to not be important for functional limitation, our results suggest otherwise when using meaningful clinical endpoints to define function," lead author Dr. Daniel K. White told Reuters Health by e-mail. Therefore, people at risk for new or worsening disease might be the ones who could benefit most from early referral for rehabilitation, he and his coauthors suggest.

Source: Reuters Health