To study the effect of combined continued estrogen and progestin replacement therapy on knee osteoarthritis (OA) symptoms of postmenopausal women.
Sixty-four postmenopausal women with radiological knee OA and symptoms aged 45-75 were divided into treatment group and control group. They were given estradiol velerate (E2V) 1.0 mg/d and medroxyprogestetone acetate (MPA) 2 mg/d (treatment group) or placebo (control group) for 6 months. Calcium 400 mg/d were given to all cases. Then 0-100 mm visual analon scale (VAS) was used to evaluate the severity of knee pain at baseline and after 1, 3, 6 month of treatment.
Significant differences on pain at night and tenderness around knee were seen in the treatment group compared with the control group after 1 months of treatment (P = 0.036 and 0.035, respectively). The improvement of pain at night, during walk and morning stiffness between the two groups showed significant difference after 6 months (P = 0.026, 0.027, and 0.011, respectively).
Combined estrogen and progestin replacement therapy can relieve the knee OA symptoms of postmenopausal women.