Knee
osteoarthritis is significantly associated with functional disability and
difficulty in performing daily activities.
Increasing quadriceps and
hamstrings muscle strength can be helpful in reducing pain and improving
mobility in patients with symptomatic meniscal tear and knee osteoarthritis.
Knee osteoarthritis is significantly associated with functional disability and difficulty in performing daily activities. Functional disability or limitation can be defined as decrease in both objectively quantified mobility and self-reported difficulty performing daily life activities. Adopting an efficient therapeutic regimen that effectively reduces functional disability might be helpful in reducing pain and improving mobility in patients with knee osteoarthritis.
An individual also requires sufficient lower extremity muscle strength to perform the daily functional tasks. Studies suggest that patients with knee osteoarthritis symptoms also demonstrate deficits in hamstrings strength and quadriceps. Lower hamstring strength and quadriceps also leads to a variety of clinical features such as poor patient reported function, a decrease in physical performance and disease progression. Understanding the relationship between quadriceps and hamstrings strength and broad set of clinical features could help in determining efficacious treatment targets.
Research conducted in previous years had shown positive
correlation between quadriceps and hamstrings muscle strength and clinical
features. But the association had been
found only in basis of instrumentation such as using an isokinetic dynamometer
and hand-held dynamometer only. Hand-held dynamometers show excellent
inter-session reliability but their applicability in clinical settings is still
lacking. Therefore, the present study evaluates the relationship between the
strength of the quadriceps and hamstrings measured with a hand-held
dynamometer.
Rationale behind
research:
Objective:
To evaluate the
associations among quadriceps and hamstrings strength measured with a hand-held
dynamometer and 1) structural damage 2) patient-reported pain, and 3)
performance of mobility tasks in individuals with symptomatic meniscal tear and
osteoarthritis.
Study outcomes:
The study outcomes included evaluation of:
Time period: NA
Outcomes:
This cross-sectional study observed that quadriceps and
hamstrings strength were inversely proportional to the patient-reported pain
and in completing activities of daily living, and structural damage. The
individuals in the strongest quartiles reported less pain, less difficulty in
performing daily activities and increased mobility. The differences between the
strongest and weakest quartiles of quadriceps and hamstring strength related to
pain and difficulty performing activities of daily life exceeded the minimal
clinical difference (8 points) for the KOOS.
The study suggested that increasing muscle strength might be
beneficial for reducing pain and difficulty performing daily life activities
and improving modility in patients with symptomatic meniscal tear and knee
osteoarthritis, however the results of the present study needs to be confirmed
in longitudinal studies and trials.
Quadriceps and hamstring muscle strength should be a key
component for the non-operative management of symptomatic meniscal tear and
knee osteoarthritis.
BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders
Associations among knee muscle strength, structural damage, and pain and mobility in individuals with osteoarthritis and symptomatic meniscal tear
Brittney A. Luc-Harkey et al.
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