The Efficacy of Prolotherapy in Osteoarthritic Knee Pain

OA is a common, debilitating condition for which there is no cure and no known cause. Prolotherapy (PrT) is an injection-based therapy for chronic musculoskeletal pain in which an irritant solution is injected at painful ligaments and tendons to produce stronger connective tissue and decrease pain. Although limited studies suggest PrT is effective may be effective for low back pain, its use has not been rigorously studied in human clinical trials for osteoarthritis.

Participants in this study will be randomly assigned to receive one of three treatments: standard PrT, injections with a saline placebo, or a pamphlet with recommendations for home knee physical therapy. Injections will be given at Weeks 1, 5, and 9; injection group subjects will have the option to receive an additional 2 sets of injections. All participants will be assessed for a total of 1 year. A set of disease-specific and general quality-of-life questionnaires will be used to assess participants' outcomes . A randomized subset of participants (N=38)will receive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)of the knee at baseline and 52 weeks. At study completion, participants who did not receive PrT will have the option to receive up to five sessions of PrT at no cost. Data will be collected for this group (minus MRI) and will be analyzed separately. Enrollment is limited to residents of Southern Wisconsin.