Knee Osteoarthritis Risk in Retired Professional Footballers
Knee Osteoarthritis Risk in Retired Professional Footballers
The OA and Football Study is an epidemiological study designed to establish the prevalence of
 knee osteoarthritis in retired professional footballers. The study will also identify the key
 risk factors associated with knee osteoarthritis. The study is comprised of three phases:
 Phase I involves the dissemination of a questionnaire (demographic details, players history,
 injury and surgery and other known risk factors of OA), Phase II is a radiographic study that
 involves x-rays in a sample of footballers both with and without knee pain and Phase III is a
 case control study which will compared retired professional footballers with age-matched
 controls recruited from the general population in the East Midlands region.
Number of Participants:

 Phase I: 1000 Phase II: 855 Phase III: 500

 Primary outcome: The questionnaire will contain player specific information and will include
 validated outcome measures such as the health status questionnaire as well as self-reported
 pain, recall of injury and surgery history. The results of the questionnaire will be exported
 firstly to Excel and subsequently, into MS Access as part of a managed database.
Phase I

 Inclusion Criteria:

 • All current or retired professional male footballers (Registered with the Professional
 Footballer Association (age range 40 -80)

 Phase II

 Inclusion Criteria:

 -  Professional footballers both with and without a history of knee pain knee OA or knee
 surgical history

 -  No contraindications of the affected joint such as gout or rheumatoid arthritis

 -  Willingness to participate in a clinical assessment of the knee and provision of blood
 samples.

 Phase III

 Inclusion Criteria for controls:

 -  Over the age of 40 (age range 40 - 80)

 -  Both with and without a history of knee pain over at least the last 1 year

 -  No history of significant trauma, injury or surgery to the lower limb

 -  American College of Rheumatology (ACR) classification of OA based on physical
 examination and clinical presentation: Pain in the knee and three of the following;
 over the age of 50, less than 30 minutes of morning stiffness, crepitus on active
 motion, bony tenderness, bony enlargement and no palpable warmth of synovium.

 Phase I

 Exclusion Criteria:

 -  Not a registered professional footballer (current or past)

 -  Inaccurate information (discrepancy with questionnaire information compared to other
 football records. This will be verified by the co-investigator, Dr Fernandes and Mr
 Sanjay Parekh)

 -  Incomplete questionnaire or duplicate questionnaire.

 Phase II

 Exclusion Criteria:

 -  Not a registered professional footballer

 -  No written informed consent to participate

 Phase III

 Exclusion Criteria:

 -  Aged 39 and under

 -  Comorbidities such as rheumatoid arthritis, gout, osteoporosis

 -  History of injury, trauma or surgery to the lower limb.