Tag Archives: hip osteoarthritis

non drug treatments osteoarthritis

Best Approach to Managing Osteoarthritis

According to a study in Arthritis Care & Research, people with hip and knee OA use oral pain medications far more than nondrug alternatives. Of the nearly 1,200 patients in the study, 70 to 82 percent took pain relievers; fewer than half tried physical therapy or other nondrug options. Most were overweight, and none got the minimum 150 minutes of physical activity a week the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends for good health.

That’s a problem, says Laith Jazrawi, MD, an orthopedic surgeon and chief of sports medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City. “We know that compared to people who are sedentary, patients who are more active have less pain and better function.”

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exercise and weight loss for osteoarthritis

Nondrug Pain Relief Underused for OA

People with hip or knee osteoarthritis (OA) use oral pain medications more often than nondrug pain treatments, such as physical therapy, knee joint injections and topical creams, according to an analysis of three clinical trials. That’s in spite of guidelines that recommend trying nondrug treatments before medications.

The analysis, which appeared recently in Arthritis Care & Research, looked at trials conducted by researchers at Duke University, the Durham Veterans Affairs (VA) Health Care System and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, all in North Carolina. A total of nearly 1,200 patients ages 61 to 65 participated in the three studies. All participants had knee or hip OA, and most were overweight and treated by a primary care doctor. None got the minimum 150 minutes of physical activity a week recommended for good health.

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