None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
Knee osteoarthritis (OA), is a painful, chronic and progressive condition. Intense efforts are being directed towards finding the causes and effective treatments. But OA has more widespread consequences, including the loss of muscle mass and function in the affected legs. The loss of muscle is potentially both a consequence of OA, due to reduced limb use, but may also be a direct consequence of inflammatory mechanism set in motion by the knee inflammation. The aims of the current project are: (a) to compare genes which are involved in muscular protein synthesis and degradation in people with knee osteoarthritis (OA) and in asymptomatic older and young people. (b) To investigate the interaction between muscle breakdown and regeneration and impaired gait pattern in people with knee OA. This research is important, as preserving muscle mass is central to regaining effective limb use and reduce disease symptoms. Hypothesis (a) Older individuals with OA will have increased localisation of inflammatory immune cells within the skeletal muscle and increased activation of protein degradation pathways within the muscle cells, compared to asymptomatic older and young people. (b) In people with OA, there is an interaction between muscle protein and gene levels that will be associated with impaired gait measures.
Interventions
This is a cross-sectional study. We will compare muscle function and metabolism of elderly people with osteoarthritis with muscle from elderly people without OA and young volunteers.
In addition, we will correlate muscle function and metabolism measures with gait, strength and quality of life measures in people with OA.
Each patient is observed twice and each session will take 60 minutes. In addition, people with OA will come to the laboratory for one session of 3 hours to assess their gait.
Sponsors
Victoria University
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
Patients with severe OA (knee replacement surgery) (age greater than or equal to 50). Asymptomatic individuals: aged and BMI matched to the OA group. Asymptomatic young-individuals (age 18-35). These volunteers will be matched for sex with the elderly people with knee OA
Exclusion criteria
- people aged 36-49 years, - in the asymptomatic individuals we will exclude those with clinical diagnosis of osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis or a history of knee trauma.
Outcome results
None listed