An exploration of a varus malaligned phenotype in knee osteoarthritis

Multiple phenotypes characterised by different disease mechanisms have been hypothesised to explain the large variability in the knee osteoarthritis (KOA) population. Repeated evidence showed that varus malalignment alone is sufficient to determine disease progression in absence of other known risk factors. Therefore, the purpose of this study is: (1) to estimate the knee compression force (CF) during the stance phase of KOA patients with a varus malaligned phenotype (VMP) characterised by exclusive degeneration of the medial compartment; (2) to compare the estimated CF and other MRI biomarkers (i.e. bone marrow lesions [BML], meniscal damage) of this VMP with a group of controls (C), a group of KOA subjects with normal alignment (NA) and a group of KOA subjects with varus malalignment and cartilage degeneration that extends to the lateral compartment (VA).