Burden of osteoarthritis in the Netherlands: a scoping review

ABSTRACT

Objective

To provide an overview of societal burden of osteoarthritis (OA) in the Netherlands.

Methods

Medline (via Ovid) and Embase databases were searched in September 2022 for all publications providing prevalence/incidence, cost or health-related quality of life (HRQoL) data of OA (all sites) in the Netherlands.

Results

Twenty-eight original studies were included in this scoping review; twelve reporting prevalence/incidence data of OA, seven reporting data on the economic burden of OA and twelve reporting HRQoL data of patients with OA. Most of the available data were from Dutch national cohorts. The prevalence of knee OA ranged from 6% to 18% across studies, from 4% to 7% for hip OA and from 12% to 56% for hand OA. OA was shown to be associated with impairment in work participation and long-term requirement of health care utilization, translating into substantial medical costs and societal costs of lost productivity. All studies comparing HRQoL among persons with OA with control persons showed a significantly lower HRQoL in patients with OA after adjustment for age, sex, and various risk factors.

Conclusions

OA is a highly prevalent disease in the Dutch population and is responsible for a significant economic and health burden.

KEYWORDS:

• Osteoarthritis
• prevalence
• incidence
• economic burden
• health-related quality of life
• the Netherlands

Article highlights

• Twenty-eight original studies were identified throught a scoping review process to inform about societal burden of osteoarthritis (OA) in the Netherlands

• OA is a highly prevalent disease in the Dutch population

• OA is associated with restrictions in work participation and substantial health care consumption, translating into costs of the lost productivity and healthcare costs

• OA is responsible for a major health burden

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Authors contribution

C Beaudart, M Hiligsmann and A Boonen conceived the study and developed the search question. Protocol was developed by C Beaudart and reviewed by M Hiligsmann and A Boonen. Once the protocol was approved, C Beaudart ran the search strategy. Study selection and data extraction were done by C Beaudart and N Li. First draft of the manuscript was written by C Beaudart. All authors read and approved the final draft.

Availability of data

All data are available upon request.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Registration

A protocol was developed and published in Open Science Framework (https://osf.io/vgx4n/).

Additional information

Funding

This paper was funded by ReumaNederland.