Can you virtually improve your knee pain?

Follow me on Twitter @RobShmerling If you’ve ever had significant or persistent knee pain, you know it can be a major problem. Climbing stairs or just walking around can be agony, and trying to exercise on a bad knee can be impossible. For people with severe osteoarthritis of the knee — the type most closely linked with aging or prior injury — knee pain may be unrelenting and often worsens over time, causing disability and reduced quality of life. Osteoarthritis is also expensive: we spend billions of dollars taking care of this condition each year in the U.S. The prevalence of osteoarthritis and the costs of caring for it are rising due to our aging population and rising rates of obesity (which is a major risk factor for osteoarthritis). While exercise, loss of excess weight, and medications can help, they tend to be only modestly effective and temporary at best. That’s why an estimated 700,000 knee replacements are performed each year in the United States. Though there are risks associated with any surgery and it’s not 100% effective, knee replacement surgery is the most reliably effective treatment for severe osteoarthritis of the knee. A new study, a new approach A recent study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine takes a unique approach to the treatment of people with osteoarthritis of the knee. Researchers divided 148 people with osteoarthritis of the knee into two groups: one group was encouraged to access standard educational material from the web re...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Arthritis Health Managing your health care Pain Management Source Type: blogs