Med J Aust: Opioid therapy may be suboptimal for pain relief in patients with osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis affects more than 500 million people worldwide and is one of the leading causes of disability

We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews and the Central Register of Controlled Trials, CINAHL, PsycINFO, AMED and the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry for published trials up to 31 October 2020

We extracted data on pain, disability, health-related quality of life, and adverse events from 36 eligible trials (total dose range, 10-210 mg morphine equivalent per day [MME])

RESULTS: Results from 19 trials (including 8965 participants; dose range, 10-126 MME/day) showed a small benefit of opioids for mid-term pain relief (mean difference [MD], -4.

Taken together, the findings suggest that opioids may provide very small pain relief and disability benefits for patients with osteoarthritis, but may also increase the risk of adverse events

Original source:

Christina Abdel Shaheed, et al.