Hand osteoarthritis, menopause and menopausal hormone therapy

Osteoarthritis Increases the Risk of Cardiovascular Disease: Data from the Osteoarthritis Initiative

“…OA was associated with a significant higher presence of carotid plaques, coronary and aortic calcifications, particularly in women. [22] It is known that hand OA is linked to the menopause more strongly than other sites [23] and the subsequent decrease in circulating endogenous estrogens, a feature which has also been linked to an increase in CVD rate. [24] However, some longitudinal studies have shown that hand OA was not associated with higher risk of CVD onset.…”

Hyperlipidaemia and incident osteoarthritis of the hand: a population-based case-control study

“…We also adjusted for firsttime prescription of hormone replacement therapy within </2 years prior to the index date (proxy for onset of menopause, which is not captured well in the CPRD), and for statin use within 365 days prior to the index date. 13 We tested the fully adjusted model for statistical interaction by age (in decades, continuous variable) and sex (significance level Wald P-value 0.10). We observed significant interaction by sex (Pvalue 0.034) and age (P-value 0.09), and therefore stratified results by sex and decades of age.…”

Decoding the genomic basis of osteoarthritis

“…These findings are consistent with our clinical classifier, molecular clustering, and with established epidemiological data showing an association between osteoarthritis and oestrogen deficiency 26 . Although studies of oestrogen therapy for osteoarthritis have been largely inconclusive 27,28 , identification of cartilage-specific oestrogen-mediated pathways, such as through KCNMA1, may allow more focussed investigational molecule development.…”