Intra-articular hyaluronic acid injections delay total knee replacement surgery in patients with osteoarthritis

Do intra-articular hyaluronic acid injections delay total knee replacement in patients with osteoarthritis – A Cox model analysis

Article specifications

This Research article was published in 2018 in Journal of PLoS One (IF 2017: 3.14) by French specialists. This study aimed to describe patients treated for knee osteoarthritis between 2006 and 2013 in France and to compare the delay from diagnosis to total knee replacement between patients who received intra-articular hyaluronic acid injections and those who did not receive the injections. A second objective was to compare direct medical costs for ambulatory care between treatment groups. A total of 14,782 patients were treated for knee osteoarthritis (67% women; mean age = 68years).

 

Result

The results of this study suggest the effectiveness of HA in delaying TKR in patients with knee OA. In addition, direct medical costs per year before TKR are similar on average in both HA patients and non-HA patients. These results support the benefits of HA and should encourage the implementation of further cost-effectiveness analyses that explore the ability of HA injections to avoid TKR over a longer period of time.