In the journals: Unequal leg length may be a risk for osteoarthritis of the knee

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Annals of Internal Medicine

 

 

As part of the nationwide Multicenter Osteoarthritis Study, researchers collected data on 3,026 adults ages 50 to 79 who had knee pain or were at risk for knee osteoarthritis. X-rays were taken to measure leg length and evaluate knee osteoarthritis at the start of the study and after 30 months. People whose legs differed in length by at least 1 centimeter (almost a half-inch) were more likely than people with equal-length legs to have osteoarthritis at the start of the study and more likely to develop the symptoms during the study. Any symptoms they had at the start were also more likely to get worse. The shorter leg was most often affected.

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