Exercise protects against insulin-dependent diabetes-induced osteoarthritis in rats: A scanning electron microscopy study

ABSTRACT

We tested the hypothesis that swim exercise can protect the articular cartilage from damages induced secondary to insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus in rats using the scanning electron microscopy and to monitor the blood levels of oxidative and antioxidative stress biomarkers that are known to be modulated in osteoarthritis (OA). A profound damage to the cartilage was observed in the diabetic rats. Our findings also show that swim exercise protects the knee joints from damage induced by diabetes as well as significantly inhibiting OA-induced upregulation of thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) and augmented superoxide dismutase (SOD) inhibition by OA. Thus, we demonstrated an effective protection by swim exercise against diabetes-induced OA in a rat model of the disease.

KEYWORDS:

• Articular cartilage
• diabetes
• osteoarthritis
• rat model
• swim exercise

Acknowledgment

The author would like to thank Dr. Mariam Al-Ani from Oasis Dental Care, Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, UK for proofreading the manuscript.

Funding

This work was supported by King Khalid University grant number KKU-Project No 2 (215).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by King Khalid University grant number KKU-Project No 2 (215).