Symptoms of Osteoarthritis
Research analysis led by Kamal Patel.
All content reviewed by the Examine.com Team. Published: Jul 5, 2013
Last Updated:
All content reviewed by the Examine.com Team. Published: Jul 5, 2013
Last Updated:
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Human Effect Matrix
The Human Effect Matrix looks at human studies (it excludes animal and in vitro studies) to tell you what supplements affect symptoms of osteoarthritis
| Grade | Level of Evidence [show legend] |
|---|---|
|
Robust research conducted with repeated double-blind clinical trials |
|
Multiple studies where at least two are double-blind and placebo controlled |
|
Single double-blind study or multiple cohort studies |
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Uncontrolled or observational studies only |
|
Level of Evidence
?
The amount of high quality evidence. The more
evidence, the more we can trust the results.
|
Outcome |
Magnitude of effect
?
The direction and size of the supplement's impact on
each outcome. Some supplements can have an increasing effect, others have a decreasing effect, and others have no effect.
|
Consistency of research results
?
Scientific research does not always agree. HIGH or
VERY HIGH means that most of the scientific research agrees.
|
Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
Minor
|
Very High See all 19 studies |
There appears to be a small decrease in osteoarthritis symptoms associated with glucosamine (as sulfate, not hydrochloride) which is somewhat unreliable but consistently outperforms placebo on meta-analyses. The magnitude of reduction, however, is somewhat minor but still comparable to acetominophen
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|
|
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Notable
|
Very High See all 4 studies |
The reduction observed with Boswellia serrata for pain and other symptoms of osteoarthritis are more profound than other supplements including that of glucosamine (reference), but study robustness is limited by industry influence.
|
|
|
|
Notable
|
Very High See all 10 studies |
Supplementation with curcumin resulted in a notable, consistent reduction in osteoarthritis symptoms across many studies. Of the osteoarthritis symptoms, it seems to be most effective for pain and physical function, while it's less clear if it reduces stiffness. Caution should be taken due to many of the studies not being high quality.
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