RADIOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT OF KNEE JOINT WIDTH DIFFERENCES IN OLDER ADULTS WITH SYMPTOMATIC MEDIAL KNEE OSTEOARTHRITIS

Knee osteoarthritis (OA) is a degenerative articular disease. The knee joint space width (JSW) is used for grading the severity of knee OA. However, there is a lack of research on differences in the widths of knee joints between both lower limbs in unilateral OA. The purpose of this research was to examine the radiological difference in the affected knee joint and contralateral knee joint by analyzing unilateral older adults with medial knee OA using both knees' JSW differences. Twenty-five subjects with unilateral medial knee OA participated. X-ray radiographs were used to assess knee JSW, and the paired t-test was performed to assess the knee joint gap width between the affected side and the unaffected side in the respective medial and lateral sides. The independent t-test compared the differences between the lateral and medial knee JSWs on the affected side and unaffected side. The paired t-test did not show a significant difference in the medial and lateral knee JSW on the affected side compared to the unaffected side (P=0.56; 0.11). Meanwhile, the independent t-test revealed a significant difference between the affected and unaffected sides (P<0.02). This study showed no significant changes in affected knee JSWs compared to unaffected sides, but the difference between the lateral and medial JSWs was significant between the knees affected and unaffected by OA in the older adults with medial knee OA.