Knee OA: Simplified Model Predicts 40-Year Risk

Researchers have developed a new, simplified version of the Nottingham 12-year risk prediction model that can identify adolescent men with an elevated long-term risk for knee osteoarthritis (OA).¹

“The individual and population 40‐year risk of knee OA is predictable in 18‐year-olds from a few easily measured covariates with moderate discrimination,” wrote the researchers who constructed the model.

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The researchers tested the efficacy of the simplified model in 40,118 Swedish men aged 18 years and older who were undergoing military conscription between 1969 and 1970.

The simplified model accounted for OA predictors that were available in adolescence only—age, body mass index (BMI), and knee injury—whereas the full Nottingham model considered age, sex, BMI, knee injury, occupational risk, and family history of OA.

The area under receiver operating characteristics curve [AUC] was 0.70 in the model development sample compared with 0.60 in an external validation sample.

Ultimately, for the simplified model, the AUC for predicting 40-year risk of knee OA was 0.60. In this model, the risk for developing knee OA was 22% in men aged 18 years with a BMI of 30 and a knee injury—approximately 3 times higher than that of men of similar age with a BMI of 25 and no knee injury (7%).

“The discrimination of this simplified model based on data available in adolescence was comparable to that of the full Nottingham model in middle age,” the researchers concluded.

—Christina Vogt

Reference:

1. Magnusson K, Turkiewicz A, Timpka S, Englund M. A prediction model for the 40‐year risk of knee osteoarthritis in adolescent men [Published online June 28, 2018]. Arthritis Care Res. https://doi.org/10.1002/acr.23685