Stopping arthritis before it starts
About 27 million Americans suffer from arthritis, and more than three million of those cases result from a joint injury, often in the knee, that provokes slow and steady cartilage deterioration.A new study from MIT suggests that a steroid drug currently used to treat inflammatory diseases could also prevent osteoarthritis from ever developing in those people, if given soon after the injury.“In essence, it’s repurposing an existing drug,” says Alan Grodzinsky, senior author of the study, a professor of biological, mechanical and electrical engineering, and the director of MIT’s Center for Biomedical Engineering. Grodzinsky and his colleagues report their findings in the Sept. 2 issue of the journal Arthritis Research and Therapy. Other authors of the paper are Yihong Lu, a recent MIT biological engineering PhD recipient, and Christopher Evans, the Maurice Edmond Mueller Professor of Orthopedic Surgery at Harvard Medical School. Severe joint injuries are more common in younger...
