To compare the effectiveness of education (ED) plus home exercise (HE) and ED plus supervised exercise (SE) according to information provided by the Better Management of Patients With Osteoarthritis (BOA) Registry, a nationally implemented rehabilitation program for patients with hip and knee osteoarthritis (OA). In addition, we investigated whether or not the effect of the treatments differed based on the joint affected by OA (hip versus knee).
We included 38,030 participants from the BOA Registry with knee or hip OA who were treated with either ED, HE, or SE. The effect of the 3 treatment options on the pain intensity reduction (range 0-10) immediately postintervention and at 12 months was estimated using a mixed-effects model adjusted for age, sex, body mass index, affected joint (hip or knee), pain at baseline, comorbidity, and level of education.
The participants undergoing HE or SE experienced a greater pain reduction compared to participants who received ED, both after the treatment (group mean change for ED -0.91 [95% confidence interval (95% CI) -1.15, -0.68], for HE -1.06 [95% CI -1.10, -1.01], and for SE -1.12 [95% CI -1.15, -1.08]) and at 12 months (group mean change for ED -0.58 [95% CI -0.87, -0.30], for HE -0.82 [95% CI -0.87, -0.76], and for SE -0.82 [95% CI -0.86, -0.77]). Patients with knee OA who underwent HE or SE improved more compared to patients with hip OA at both follow-ups.
In primary care, HE and SE lead to similar reductions in pain intensity but are more effective than ED alone. In addition, people with knee OA benefit more from HE and SE than people with hip OA.