Predicting Symptomatic Progression of Osteoarthritis

INTRODUCTION: Knee osteoarthritis (OA) is a major source of morbidity in the aging population with a prevalence of over 16% in people older than 45. Prior studies typically define OA progression in terms of joint space narrowing or cartilage loss measured from radiographs or MRI. However, these methods do not directly capture the impact of OA on the patient Direct measures of OA on the symptoms and function of the patient include patient-reported outcome measures such as the Knee Osteoarthritis Outcome Score (KOOS) and performance tests such as 20-meter walk pace and repeated chair stand pace. The goal of the proposed study is to analyze MRI’s from the OAI and determine which baseline MRI findings best correlate with symptomatic OA progression.