Background: Knee osteoarthritis is a joint disease that is either symptomatic or asymptomatic. Changes in structures in and around knee joint occurs in this condition. This disease is more dominant in females than in males, the prevalence also is increasing with increased age and presence of obesity. Knee osteoarthritis is managed by non- operative treatment options such as exercise and analgesics in primary care.

Aim: To assess patient knowledge about non operative treatment of symptomatic knee osteoarthritis provided in family medicine department.

Method: This study is cross sectional descriptive study, it was conducted between the periods from 1^st May 2017 to 1^stDecember 2017 on symptomatic knee OA patients who were visiting the orthopedic clinic at family medicine department in Security Forces Hospital. The study was performed using questionnaire. All Statistical analysis was perform using SAS version 9.2 (SAS Institute, Inc, Cary, NC).

Results: 43.6% of patients knew about conservative management for knee OA, weight reduction was the most common strategy known by patients (95.1%), followed by physiotherapy (77%), and then pain killer (45.9%). 94.3% of patients used pain killer, 51.4% used weight reduction, 75.7% used physiotherapy and 25% used intra-articular injections. 

Conclusion: There was low knowledge of patients about knee OA conservative management, several demographics and co-morbidities were associated with the level of knowledge. Patients had negative attitude to family physicians regarding their treatment.

Keywords: Knee OA management, Knowledge, Knee OA patients, Family physicians.

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Anfal Mohammad Aljohani

Family Medicine Resident