Abstract
<p class="Abstract">Seventy-two females with mild to moderate knee osteoarthritis were included in this randomized double-blind placebo-controlled study. Patients in the intervention group (n=36) received L-carnitine supplement (750 mg/day) for two months. L-Carnitine supplementation led to decrease in serum TNF-α and MMP-3 levels significantly in comparison with the baseline (p&lt;0.001 and p&lt;0.001, respectively) and placebo group (p&lt;0.001 and p=0.03, respectively). In addition, physician’s global assessment of the severity of osteoarthritis decreased significantly in the L-carnitine group (p&lt;0.001) and placebo group (p=0.012) after supplementation. At the end of the study, a significant difference was observed between the two groups for mean physician’s global assessment of the severity of osteoarthritis (p&lt;0.001), adjusted for baseline values and duration of osteoarthritis. L-Carnitine supplementation has beneficial effects in reducing inflammatory biomarkers in knee osteoarthritis patients which subsequently leads to the alleviation of disease symptoms.</p>
Highlights
Osteoarthritis is the most prevalent type of inflammatory joint disorder, presented by articular cartilage destruction and periarticular bone changes (Felson, 2004)
Decreased NF-κ activity leads to the decrease in inducible form of NO synthase (iNOS) protein expression and nitric oxide synthesis, which has a key role in the pathogenesis of inflammatory diseases (Koc et al, 2011; Moeinian et al, 2013)
It has been reported that reactive oxygen species (ROS) may lead to the inflammation which in turn contributes to the increase in expression of proinflammatory cytokines and activation of NF-κ pathway (Setia and Sanyal, 2012)
Summary
Osteoarthritis is the most prevalent type of inflammatory joint disorder, presented by articular cartilage destruction and periarticular bone changes (Felson, 2004). The prevalence of this disease increases significantly with age (Bellare et al, 2014) and is more prevalent in women than men. Osteoarthritic cartilage is characterized by the imbalance between MMPs and TIMPs. It has been revealed that levels of matrix-destructive enzymes such as MMP-1, 3, and -13 increased and those of TIMP-1, a proteinase inhibitor, decreased in osteoarthritis cartilage (Dean et al, 1989; Martel-Pelletier et al, 1994). The inflammatory cytokines interleukin-1-beta (IL-1 ) and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF- ) have been well established in osteoarthritis pathogenesis and are known to increase the secretion of MMPs and reduce the production of TIMPs (Kapoor et al, 2011)
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