Do Knee Injections Offer Benefit With Knee Arthritis Pain

Study Summary

Corticosteroid and viscosupplementation injections have been used for years to treat osteoarthritic pain in knees. Recent studies have varied in reporting the effectiveness with these injections. None have been found to analyze pain scores between the groups though. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of corticosteroid injection (a single injection of 1 cc of 40 mg kenalog: 4 cc 0.5% Naropin) and viscosupplementation injection (Euflexxa and Synvisc, both are 2 cc of the medication given in 3 injections over a 3 week period). This will be analyzed with a modified visual analog scale over a period of time. An initial VAS will be collected prior to the first injection in the clinic. With the viscosupplementation injections, a VAS will be collected prior to injections 2 and 3 as well. These VAS are logged in the patient's chart. For both types of injections, the participant will be called and a VAS will be recorded 6 weeks post injection and 3 month post injection. These VAS will NOT be logged in the participant's chart. All VAS will be collected/recorded by the principal investigator. Statistical analysis will be conducted with a paired t-test (p\<0.05 with a confidence interval at 95%) from the pre-injection VAS and VAS subsequently.

Primary Outcome

The primary endpoint is significant improvement in visual analog scores for corticosteroid vs viscosupplementation injections pre- and post-injections. VAS scores range from 0-10, 0 being no pain, 10 being the worst pain imaginable. The hypothesis is the injections will help reduce the participant's perception of pain, resulting in lower VAS scores. If the power size is valid, VAS will be compared between males/females.

Interventions

• DRUG Corticosteroid injection