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For Arthritis, This May Beat Pain RelieversApril 14, 2000: Most Common Form Of Arthritis Relieved By TreatmentBy Tony Cappasso, Contributing WriterApril 14, 2000, 1:43 p.m. EDT Regular physical therapy may help older people who suffer from osteoarthritis, researchers say. It may help older patients more in the long term than taking pain relievers, according to the research team. Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis. The ailment typically develops because over time, the ends of bones that come together to form joints begin rubbing together, leading to chronic pain and inflammation. Researchers studied 83 patients with osteoarthritis of the knee. They assigned them randomly to receive physical therapy treatments or a dummy treatment. The treatment group got physical therapy to their knees and their lower spines, hips and ankles. The dummy group was treated with ultrasound therapy at levels too low to have an effect, according to the research team. They published their findings in the Feb. 1 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine. At the end of four weeks, the researchers compared the ability of volunteers in both groups to walk for six minutes and asked them to evaluate their levels of soreness and stiffness. The evaluators did not know what kind of treatment the patients had received. They re-examined the patients after eight weeks and a year. The group that received physical therapy showed major improvement in their ability to walk longer with less pain and stiffness than did the group that got the sham treatment, the researchers found. The improvement continued steadily each time the group was re-examined. At the end of the one-year followup, only 5 percent of the patients who received physical therapy needed knee surgery. By contrast, 20 percent of the patients in the sham-treatment group had surgery on their knees. Previous Stories:
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Most people with osteoarthritis are older than 60. One third of people between the ages of 63 and 94 have osteoarthritis in their knees that can be painful and often limits their ability to get up from a chair, stand, walk or climb stairs. Medications such as ibuprofen are not always effective and may cause stomach problems and other complications.
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