Knee pain…the likelihood that you experience or will experience knee pain or know someone who
suffers with knee pain is high. Knee pain due to osteoarthritis is a shared condition around
the world. Apple Country Chiropractic promotes exercise to our our Williamson
chiropractic knee pain patients. We know we come
across sounding like a broken record on
exercise, but exercise is still ‘king’ when it comes to knee pain
care! And other new knee pain research touts a few new
treatment approaches to try, too.
OSTEOARTHRITIS
Osteoarthritis (OA) is a disease of degenerated cartilage or
wear and tear damage to cartilage resulting in
disability and other health problems affecting over 500 million
adults globally. Knee OA and Hip OA
are two of the most common types with knee OA being the most
common. The goal of treatment of OA is management and reduction
of symptoms, not cure. Drug approaches include NSAIDs while
non-drug approaches incorporate exercise (walking), aerobic
exercise, weight loss, diet, hot/cold therapy, electrotherapy to improve
muscle strength and decrease joint pain. Surgery
(arthroscopy and joint replacement therapy) was described as
a last treatment option. The authors of this report emphasized
that precautions to keep joints healthy and disease-free were suitable
and essential. (1) Those are desirous
goals.
DESIRED RESULTS OF TREATMENT FOR KNEE OA
How do you determine if an intervention is successful to your pain? Your hoped for outcome
is the most important. For osteoarthritis, one of the foremost
diseases that disables us humans, walking for pleasure was documented
by data collected for the Genome Wide Association Study (GWAS) to be
statistically significant for tackling knee
osteoarthritis at the genetic level. (2) Today’s researchers are also working to define just what “minimal clinically important
change” is, what the minimum improvement a patient like you would perceive or say made going
through the treatment was worth it. For patients
with osteoarthritis who underwent non-surgical treatments,
the amount of knee flexion they could perform after treatment was from
3.8 to 6.4 degrees. Other interesting information researchers uncovered
from the 72 studies they analyzed was that a rise
in flexion was associated with decreased pain
and increased function. (3) These are positive outcomes!
…AND WHAT ABOUT PLASMA-RICH PLATELET THERAPY?
In the non-surgical realm of treatment for knee
osteoarthritis, platelet rich plasma (PRP)
injection has grown in availability
alongside traditional exercise for knee OA pain. A randomized control trial contrasted
three treatment combinations PRP injection alone (three weekly
injections), exercise alone (6 weeks program/12 sessions of strengthening and
functional exercise), and PRP with exercise. At 24 weeks post
treatments, the PRP didn’t change pain in
mild-to-mode knee OA patients compared to exercise alone.
As a matter of fact, the exercise alone group outcomes were
clinically superior for function and health related quality of life. Even
though the PRP added cost to the combined treatment, it didn’t show itself to be superior to
exercise alone either. The researchers ended their paper with
the statement that exercise alone was recommended to reduce pain
and improve function. (4) Certainly, more studies will continue
to reveal the impact of such treatments as PRP.
CONTACT Apple Country Chiropractic
Listen to this PODCAST
on Osteoarthritis of the Knee with Dr. Luigi Albano on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr.
Michael Johnson as he shares the
effectiveness of the gentle, adapted protocols of The Cox®
Technic System of Spinal Pain Management in treating the osteoarthritic knee! A
beneficial, relieving treatment approach to incorporate with exercise!
Schedule your Williamson chiropractic
appointment soon. From what we read, it looks like
exercise is still ‘king’ when managing osteoarthritis of
the knee. We can help you find the right exercises and even integrate
some distraction to help the knee.