The aim of the present study was to examine whether the degenerative and morphological changes of articular cartilage in early stage knee osteoarthritis (OA) occurred equally for both femoral- and tibial- or patellar- articular cartilage using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-based analyses.
This cross-sectional study was approved by the ethics committee of our university. Fifty patients with early stage painful knee OA were enrolled. The patients underwent 3.0 T MRI on the affected knee joint. Healthy volunteers who did not show MRI-based OA changes were also recruited as controls (n = 19). The degenerative changes of the articular cartilage were quantified by a T2 mapping analysis, and any structural changes were conducted using Whole Organ Magnetic Resonance Imaging Score (WORMS) technique.
All patients showed MRI-detected OA morphological changes. The T2 values of femoral condyle (FC) (P < 0.0001) and groove (P = 0.0001) in patients with early stage knee OA were significantly increased in comparison to those in the control, while no significant differences in the T2 values of patellar and tibial plateau (TP) were observed between the patients and the control. The WORMS cartilage and osteophyte scores of the femoral articular cartilage were significantly higher than those in the patellar- (P = 0.001 and P = 0.007, respectively) and tibial- (P = 0.0001 and P < 0.0001, respectively) articular cartilage in the patients with early stage knee OA.
The degradation and destruction of the femoral articular cartilage demonstrated a greater degree of deterioration than those of the tibial- and patellar- articular cartilage in patients with early stage knee OA.