At Blackberry Clinic our doctors and practitioners are often asked if it is ok to keep on running with knee or hip arthritis. Dr Petrides found this article and wanted to share it with those of you who might be considering cutting short your running over concerns about damage to your joints. It makes for interesting reading, and is reassuring for those of you who are enjoying your running.
According to a recent article in the British Journal of Sports Medicine it is a myth that recreational running causes knee osteoarthritis. The authors are James L N Alexander, Richard W Willy, Adam G Culvenor, Christian J Barton. The following facts have been taken from this article and the references are below.
Runners and health care professionals often are concerned that a long period of running is a risk factor for the development and progression of knee arthritis.
These percentages make interesting reading:
3.5% of amateur/recreational runners have knee or hip osteoarthritis
10.2% of sedentary people have knee or hip osteoarthritis
13.3% of ex- elite/professional international runners have knee or hip osteoarthritis
FACTS ABOUT RUNNING AND OA
Recreational running is not harmful for knee joint articular cartilage in runners without symptomatic knee osteoarthritis. (ref 2,3)
Participation in recreational running may provide a protective effect against the development of knee and hip osteoarthritis (ref 1)
Higher rates of knee and hip osteoarthritis have been reported in non-runners and runners exposed to sustained elite-level training loads (ref 3)
However, it is unclear whether these associations are causative or confounded by other knee osteoarthritis risk factors, such as previous injury (ref 3)
WHAT IF A RUNNER ALREADY HAS KNEE OSTEOARTHRITIS?
Runners with knee osteoarthritis should feel safe continuing to run but may benefit from running less frequently to allow for sufficient cartilage recovery time between running bouts. (ref 4)
Running does not appear to accelerate the progression of existing knee osteoarthritis in runners more than 50 years of age. (ref 5)
It is currently not sound advice to tell a runner with knee osteoarthritis who is managing their symptoms to cease running.
However, the ideal running dose to optimise joint health in runners with and without knee osteoarthritis remains unclear. (ref 2, 3)
References
1 Esculier (2018) PLoS One
2 Heckelman (2020) OSJM
3 Alentorn-Gell (2017 JOSPT
4 Esculier (2019) The Knee
5 Lo (2018 ) Clinical Rheumatology
