Obesity Equal Spontaneous Knee Osteoarthritis?

Can being overweight, coupled with an unstable meniscus, spontaneously bring on osteoarthritis (OA)? Looks like a possibility, says new research.

The study, “The role of excessive body weight and meniscal instability in the progression of osteoarthritis in a rat model,” was published in the December 2018 edition of The Knee.

Co-author Peter E. Kondrashov, Ph.D., professor and chair at the Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine in Missouri, explains to OTW, “There are 34 million adults affected by obesity in the United States alone and a billion worldwide. Previous studies concluded that reducing body weight could prevent every fifth patient from having knee surgery. Our model tested whether obesity played an equal role in the onset and development of spontaneous and traumatic osteoarthritis.”

The authors randomly assigned 40 rats to regular diet sham surgery, regular diet medial meniscus destabilization (DMM) surgery, high-fat diet sham surgery, or high-fat diet DMM surgery…Progression of OA was evaluated in femoral condyles and tibial plateaus using the Osteoarthritis Research Society International scoring system.

Dr. Kondrashov told OTW, “Obesity contributed to the spontaneous onset of knee osteoarthritis and the disease process affected most articular surfaces of the knee joint in the obese rats. In the model of traumatic osteoarthritis though there were no differences in osteoarthritis progression between the control group and the overweight group. Results suggest excessive body weight contributes to the spontaneous onset of osteoarthritis buthas lesser role in its progression in traumatic OA.”

“The results from our study emphasized the importance of preventative care and, in particular, reduction of body weight to decrease the risk of developing osteoarthritis.Even without trauma, obesity itself is enough to cause spontaneous osteoarthritis in the knee joint. Once the osteoarthritis has started in the knee joint, extrinsic factors play lesser role, so preventive care of this disease is crucial.”