“…More interestingly, there are also very few studies that describe the efficacy of a drug combination (i.e., GS-CS) in improving cartilage repair processes (Chan et al, 2005). The findings of our study appear to complement previous clinical studies in animals and in vitro conditions, demonstrating that: (1) combined therapy has been shown to have protective and beneficial effects in vitro by acting synergistically in stimulating the production of PGs in articular cartilage, while inhibiting the activity of the degradative enzymes (Dechant et al, 2005), and (2) in studies involving animal models, this combination is shown to exert a protective effect on cartilage degradation (Bassleer et al, 1998;Chan et al, 2005). However, these findings are not consistently supported by others, with many reports showing mixed results (Lipeela et al, 2000;Orth et al, 2002;Dodge and Jimenez, 2003;Ilic et al, 2003;Lippiello, 2003;Persiani et al, 2004).…”