HIP OSTEOARTHRITIS

Hi Finola I have been reading over the last 2 weeks about osteoarthritis. I thought that osteoarthritis is wearing down of the cartilage and bones and that it just gets worse over time. Will spending more time increasing my physical activity not make my knee worse? Will exercising my knee really improve my knee pain? Pat Hi Pat, Pain due to osteoarthritis is complex but in short it does effect the whole joint and yes it usually occurs as we get older, but it also can occur in the younger population too. Pain can make you avoid activity and can affect your mood. However, when you avoid activity due to the pain this causes your muscles to weaken, can cause weight gain and further impact your mood. This leaves you in a cycle that makes your pain feel even worse. In fact staying active, losing weight – if you need to and strengthening your muscles will help prevent the decline and actually help with the pain. To get stronger you need to exercise at the right intensity, if it’s too easy you probably will not increase your strength. Exercising with some knee pain is ok, pain does not mean that the exercises are causing damage, in fact strengthening the muscles around your leg will help you to become strong and enable you to do what you want/need to do. Exercise also triggers the brain to release chemicals from the brain (endorphins) that have a pain relieving effect. Expect set backs or flare ups along your journey, don’t leave these set backs stop your journey on strengthening your knee and returning to the things you need and want to do. I hope this clarifies the benefits of strengthening the muscles around the joint that is affected by osteoarthritis and that increasing physical activity will indeed help in the long term. Regards, Finola