Objective: Knee osteoarthritis is the most common form of joint disorder and a leading cause of pain and functional disability among elderly female population or in postmenopausal phase of females. Osteoarthritis is now considered as a low grade inflammatory condition. VCAM-1 is an inducible cell surface glycoprotein and mediates heterotypic cellular aggregation. Therefore, the aim of this study is to assess the role of soluble VCAM-1in knee osteoarthritis among postmenopausal women.

Materials and Methods: The present study includes 100 postmenopausal women of age 50 years or above with clinical symptoms of knee osteoarthritis as cases and 100 normal healthy female age matched individuals as controls. CRP was assayed in serum by using latex-enhanced turbidimetric immunoassay method. Soluble VCAM-1 and estrogen were estimated by ELISA method in all 200 subjects. Statistical analysis was made by student independent sample t-test. Correlation was determined by using spearman’s rank correlation coefficient.

Result: The serum level of soluble VCAM-1 was found statistically highly significantly increased (p<0.001) while estrogen was found highly significantly decreased (p<0.001) in postmenopausal women with symptoms of knee osteoarthritis as compared to control healthy subjects. CRP was also found significantly increased in postmenopausal women with symptoms of knee osteoarthritis as compared to control healthy subjects.  A correlative study showed significant negative correlation between VCAM-1 and estrogen hormone while positive correlation between VCAM-1 and CRP in postmenopausal women with symptoms of knee osteoarthritis.

Conclusion: The increased levels of soluble VCAM-1 showed an active inflammation or cartilage damage. Thus, it can be used as a biomarker for the assessment of onset of osteoarthritis.

Keywords: VCAM-1, Knee osteoarthritis, Postmenopausal women, Estrogen.

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Reetika Shrivastava

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