Faraneh Farsad, Zahra Davoudi, Parisa Delkash, Arman Ahmadzadeh,
Volume 47, Issue 2 (7-2023)
Abstract
Background and Aim: Osteoarthritis (OA) is a very common painful disease of the musculoskeletal system. The limitation of the effectiveness of current analgesics had been proven and better analgesics are needed. Duloxetine is one of the drugs that has been observed to have analgesic effects, but there are few studies about it. The aim of this study was to compare the effect of duloxetine and glucosamine sulfate as pain relievers in reducing knee osteoarthritis pain.
Methods: We performed a single-blind, trial of 60 mg of duloxetine and 500mg of glucoeamine in 60 subjects with osteoarthritis pain. Patients were divided into two groups and received 6 weeks of duloxetine orglucoeamine. The measured outcome was a reduction in average pain intensity after 6 months for subjects completing the trial. Symptoms were scored by the WOMAC Index. Data analysis was performed using Fisher's, t-test, and Mann-Whitney tests by a person who was unaware of the results.
Results: 28 patients in the duloxetine group and 29 patients in the glucosamine sulfate group completed the study. No statistically significant difference was found between the two groups before the intervention (P-value > 0.5). The mean age of patients in the Deloxetine group was 65.47 ± 0.3 years and in the Glucosamine group, it was 65.55 ± 0.4 years (P-value = 0.384). There was no difference in gender distribution between the two groups (P-value = 0.91). The WOMAC score was significantly decreased in the duloxetine group compared to glucosamine (p < 0.05). It was also found that the pain indices were significantly reduced in the Deloxetine group.
Conclusion: Duloxetine significantly reduce pain intensity on the WOMAC and could be considered as a suggested treatment for osteoarthritis pain.
