Effectiveness of glucosamine for symptoms of knee osteoarthritis: Results from an internet-based randomized double-blind controlled trial
Section snippets
Methods
We sought to recruit 200 subjects with knee osteoarthritis and to enroll them in a 12-week, double-blind, randomized placebo-controlled trial of glucosamine 1.5 g/d. The entire trial, including recruitment, was performed using the Internet. Methodological observations from this study have already been reported (14). In brief, our goal was to translate as many elements as possible of a traditional, double-blind, randomized placebo-controlled trial into the electronic domain, conducted through a
Results
Of 293 eligible applicants, 37 participated in website testing and development and 51 declined to participate (Figure 1). The remaining 205 individuals were assigned randomly to the glucosamine (n = 101) or placebo (n = 104) arm. Nineteen enrollees were lost to follow-up, discontinued intervention, or violated protocol prior to week 6, leaving 186 participants (93 in each arm). Duration of participation was similar in the two treatment groups (75% [n = 76] vs. 74% [n = 77] completed the full 12
Discussion
We found that glucosamine was no more effective than placebo in treating symptoms of knee osteoarthritis. Our study also demonstrates the feasibility of performing a clinical trial entirely over the Internet. In a previous report (14), we showed that participants in an Internet-based trial were motivated, adherent, and largely similar to participants in traditional clinical trials of knee osteoarthritis, and that the osteoarthritis index scores were similar to those reported in traditional
Acknowledgment
Thanks are due to Leslie Lenert, MD, for his helpful suggestions.
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This study was supported by a grant from the Arthritis Foundation and through support from the National Library of Medicine (LM06856).