Functional Limitation Associated With Knee Osteoarthritis Helped By Walking

Recent findings published in the journal Arthritis Care & Research show that walking can help to reduce functional limitation for individuals dealing with knee osteoarthritis.

For the study, researchers measured steps taken each day over a seven day period, with the correlation between steps per day at baseline and the risk of developing functional limitation two years later.

They observed that each additional 1,000 step per day correlated with a 16 and 18 percent reduction in incident functional limitation, based on performance-based and self-report measures.

Researchers noted that walking helps to reduce the incidence of functional limitation in individuals with or at risk of knee osteoarthritis, over two years, according to a new study.

"Walking >6,000 steps per day provides a preliminary estimate of the level of walking activity to protect against developing functional limitation in people with or at risk of knee osteoarthritis," the authors noted, in a news release.

Furthermore, they looked to determine if walking on its own protected against the development of functional limitation in a cohort of 1,788 people with mean age 67 years, with or at risk of knee osteoarthritis.

Findings revealed that the best thresholds to distinguish incident functional limitation were <6,000 steps per day for performance-based measures (sensitivity, 67.3 percent; specificity, 71.8 percent) and <5,900 steps per day for self-report measures (sensitivity, 58.7 percent; specificity, 68.9 percent), respectively.