Pain Relief in Knee Osteoarthritis Reduces the Propensity to Trip on an Obstacle

The pain associated with knee osteoarthritis (OA) has been shown to lead to an increased propensity to trip on an obstacle. Pain-relieving intra-articular injections are widely utilized in the treatment of knee OA. This study examined the effects of pain-relieving intra-articular knee injections on the ability to avoid contacting a suddenly appearing obstacle in patients with knee OA. Obstacle avoidance success rates, pain, body mass index, visual acuity, contrast sensitivity, depth perception, and single-leg stance duration were evaluated in nine patients with painful osteoarthritis of the knee and 14 age-matched healthy control subjects. Obstacle avoidance success rates, pain, and single leg stance duration were tested a second time in the patients with knee OA after they received their injections, which contained a fast-acting local anesthetic to provide rapid pain relief. After receiving the pain-relieving knee injections, patients with knee OA had 48% less pain and were 31% more successful in avoiding stepping on the obstacle. However, after receiving the injection, the obstacle avoidance success rates remained 20% less than those of the healthy controls. The results of this study suggest that knee pain-relief can decrease the propensity of people with painful knee OA to trip and fall over an obstacle. However, pain-relief alone did not return the patients with knee OA in this study to a disease-free risk of tripping. © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.