Greater medial meniscus extrusion predicted incident radiographic knee osteoarthritis (KOA) in an evaluation of 442 knees. Further, early onset KOA showed greater differences for meniscus position between incident and non-incident knees than late onset KOA.

To test the hypothesis that quantitative measures of meniscus extrusion predict incident radiographic KOA prior to advent of radiographic disease, investigators compared 206 knees with incident KOA to 232 control knees without incident KOA. Researchers adjusted for age, sex, BMI, race, and clinical site.

The average medial extrusion distance was significantly greater for incident knees vs nonincident knees, as was the percent extrusion area of the medial meniscus. There were no differences observed for the lateral meniscus or the tibial plateau coverage.

Citation: Emmanuel K, Quinn E, Niu J, et al.. Quantitative measures of meniscus extrusion predict incident radiographic knee osteoarthritis – data from the Osteoarthritis Initiative. Osteoarthritis Cartilage. 2015; August 26 ,2015. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.joca.2015.08.003.