Knee Gel Injections | Hyaluronic acid vs Conjuran vs Cortisone Jab

Degenerative arthritis of the knee joint has become a major social problem worldwide due to population aging, enter knee gel injections…

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Are knee gel injections worth it?
How long do knee injections last?
What are the side effects of knee injections?
What is the new injection for knee pain?
Which knee injection is best?
Can you walk after a knee injection?
How many times can you get gel injections in knee?
What is the safest injection for knee pain?

Are knee gel injections worth it?

Conservative measures are always worth considering, when the other option is surgical knee replacement. The pain relief and improvement in weight bearing function is significant, as proven by clinical studies. However the results vary from person to person.

How long do knee injections last?

The effect varies from person to person. Generally pain relief can be achieved for up to 6 months.

What are the side effects of knee injections?

Pain, swelling, bruising can occur and can last for a few days.

What is the new injection for knee pain?

Hyaluronate can be injected to ease knee pain for those who do not respond to oral pain killers. Conjuran, a sodium polynucleotide is another newer option for knee pain.

Which knee injection is best?

An inflamed painful knee responds best to cortisone injection. Cortisone injections are helpful, work quickly but the effects are shortlived, often lasting for a few weeks at best. For other forms of knee pain, the options include hyaluronate and Conjuran injection. These knee gel injections have greater longevity of result in terms of months, but may only work in 50% of patients.

Can you walk after a knee injection?

Yes normal activities can be resumed, but do refrain from excessive stress on knee joints within 48 hours.

How many times can you get gel injections in knee?

In majority of cases, weekly injections, 2-3x are required and can last up to 6 months.

What is the safest injection for knee p ain?

Cortisone injections are helpful, work quickly for knee pain, but the effects are shortlived, lasting for a few weeks at best.

Reference:

Kim JY, Kim YN, Lee YJ, Sim SE, Ko YR, Shim JW, Lee KS, Joo M, Park HJ. Pilot Study to Evaluate the Efficacy of Polynucleotide Sodium Compared to Sodium Hyaluronate and Crosslinked Sodium Hyaluronate in Patients with Knee Osteoarthritis. J Clin Med. 2021 Mar 9;10(5):1138.

doi: 10.3390/jcm10051138. PMID: 33803080; PMCID: PMC7963169.

This study shows that polynucleotide sodium could be beneficial, as it resulted in a comparable improvement in the weight-bearing pain in patients with knee OA as sodium hyaluronate and crosslinked sodium hyaluronate. The strength of our clinical study is that it is to compares polynucleotide sodium and crosslinked sodium hyaluronate. Previous randomized controlled trials have been conducted to compare polynucleotide and sodium hyaluronate in the form of intraarticular injections in terms of their efficacy and safety in treating knee OA [5,18,19]. Regarding the analgesic effect of polynucleotide compared with that of sodium hyaluronate, the severity of ‘weight-bearing pain’ and ‘resting pain’ improved significantly more at 6 weeks after the start of treatment in the group treated with polynucleotide sodium than in the group treated with sodium hyaluronate.

However, there were no differences between the group treated with polynucleotide sodium and the group treated with crosslinked sodium hyaluronate regarding the changes in different clinical indicators from before treatment to 6 weeks after the start of treatment.The strength of polynucleotides suggested in previous papers was that they could not only provide mechanical supplementation (sodium hyaluronate) but also cause physiologic changes [5,25]. The mechanism of action polynucleotides is believed to be that polynucleotides bind to large amounts of water and undergo structural rearrangemen by orienting water molecules to form a 3D gel

In this preliminary study, we showed that polynucleotide sodium could reduce weight-bearing pain more effectively 6 weeks after the start of treatment than sodium hyaluronate and crosslinked sodium hyaluronate in knee OA patients. To address the limitations imposed by the preliminary nature of this study, our center is conducting a randomized study with a larger sample size.