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What determines how effective exercise is as a treatment for osteoarthritis?

What is it about?

Exercise is an effective treatment for osteoarthritis. However, the effect may vary from one patient to another. We have combined the results from 77 studies of 6472 participants with knee or hip osteoarthritis to see which factors can influence who will experience improvements in their pain, function, performance and quality of life when undertaking 8 weeks of exercise.

Why is it important?

We found in this study that in people with knee or hip osteoarthritis 8 weeks of exercise can have moderate but significant benefits for pain and function. However, these benefits then gradually decrease, to be no better than usual care at 9-18 months. People who were younger and not waiting for knee replacement were also more likely to benefit from exercise therapy.

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The following have contributed to this page:
Joanne Stocks
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