Evidence, Efficasy and Safety of the Chondroprotective Parapharmaceuticals in Treatment of the Early Stages of Osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis (OA) is the most common joint disease that significantly affects the patients’ quality of life and requires significant medical and social investments for treatment and rehabilitation. There are no therapeutic agents which would be able to regenerate lost or damaged hyaline cartilage. The objective: to assess the efficacy and safety of the chondroprotective parapharmaceutical agent Flexogial in the complex treatment of patients with initial stages of the knee ОА. Materials and methods. 12-weeks study was conducted with the participation of 60 patients with knee OA aged 53,7±2,9 years, women – 36 (60%), men – 24 (40%) with the initial stages of the disease (I–II radiological stage). The main clinical group consisted of 30 patients who took the chondroprotective complex agent Flexogial 15 ml once a day; the comparison group included 30 patients who were administered glucosamine sulfate 1500 mg in a monopreparation taken once a day. Efficacy of the treatment was evaluated using the VAS scale, Tegner’s scale, Lisholm scale at the beginning of treatment, after 6 and 12 weeks in dynamics with subsequent statistical processing of the results. Results. The study demonstrated better indicators of functional activity and less pain intensity in the affected joints in patients of the main group who took the parapharmaceutical agent Flexogial compared to the group of patients who took glucosamine monopreparation with the same number of registered adverse events in both groups of patients (5%). Conclusions. The results of the presented clinical study proved the advantage of use of the combined chondroprotective drinking complex Flexogial in comparison with the monopharmaceutical preparation glucosamine sulfate in the treatment of patients with early stages knee OA in terms of the effect on the intensity of pain and improvement in the parameters of the functional activity of patients after 6 and 12 weeks with the same frequency of registered adverse events