Expanding and explaining symptoms in knee osteoarthritis trajectories: fluctuations, flares, and future directions

Over the past decade, our understanding of knee osteoarthritis (OA) as a chronic long-term condition has evolved. Once primarily viewed as a chronic disease process of steady, inevitable decline, variations in the symptomatic course have now been demonstrated and replicated1. Group-based trajectory modeling, such as latent class growth models and growth mixture models, are data-driven processes designed to identify subgroups of people within longitudinal cohort datasets2. The application of these approaches to knee OA pain has identified distinct subgroups demonstrating stable pain trajectories, ranging from mild to severe, worsening trajectories, and (for some) improving trajectories3.
Source: Osteoarthritis and Cartilage - Category: Rheumatology Authors: Tags: Editorial Source Type: research