Assessment of blood flow around the knee joint in patients with knee osteoarthritis by color Doppler ultrasound.

OBJECTIVE

To explore a method for early diagnosis of knee osteoarthritis (OA) by comparing vascular morphology and hemodynamic parameters between healthy controls and patients, and explore the effects of age on the blood flow of healthy subjects.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

80 healthy subjects and 106 patients with knee OA were recruited. Color Doppler ultrasound was used to measure the vascular morphology and hemodynamic parameters of 11 blood vessels around the knee joint. A general linear model was used to analyze the difference of blood flow parameters between healthy controls and patients, and to explore the effects of sex and age on the blood flow of healthy subjects.

RESULTS

Age has no significant effect on the vessel diameter of healthy subjects, and it only affect the blood flow velocity (P ＜ 0.05) and blood flow volume (P ＜0.0083) of a few blood vessels. There was no significant difference in vascular morphological parameter between healthy controls, patients with mild OA and moderate/severe OA, but there was significant difference in vascular hemodynamic parameters (P ＜ 0.0167). Specifically, in the early stage of knee OA, hemodynamic parameters of main arteries in patients did not change significantly, but those of branch vessels changed significantly (P ＜ 0.0167). With the development of knee OA, the difference of hemodynamic parameters of branch vessels in patients increased gradually.

CONCLUSION

Hemodynamic parameters of branch vessels around the knee joint have changed significantly in the early stage of knee OA, which can be treated as an important index to screening the early patients.