Vitamin D Status and Pain Sensitization in Knee Osteoarthritis: A Critical Review of the Literature

Abstract

Diagnostic imaging of disease severity has been found thus far to be a relatively modest predictor of knee osteoarthritis (OA) pain and disability, suggesting that other factors likely contribute to clinical symptoms in this condition. Recent evidence suggests that sensitization of the peripheral and central pathways that process nociceptive information (i.e., pain sensitization) is an important contributor to knee OA clinical symptoms. Furthermore, low levels of vitamin D have been found to be associated with the presence of pain sensitization, as well as the overall experience of clinical pain severity in knee OA. African–Americans with knee OA may be at increased risk for poor clinical outcomes given evidence of lower vitamin D levels as well as greater pain sensitization compared with non-Hispanic whites. Whether vitamin D supplementation is effective for alleviating knee OA clinical symptoms is an important topic to be addressed in future research with racially diverse samples that include sufficient numbers of African–Americans.

KEYWORDS :

• African–Americans
• healthcare disparities
• knee osteoarthritis
• pain sensitization
• vitamin D status

Disclaimer

The contents are solely the views of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH.

Financial & competing interests disclosure

This work was supported in part by NIH/NIA Grant R37AG033906-12. TL Glover received support from the John A Hartford Foundation (2011–2013) as a Building Academic Geriatric Nursing Capacity Scholar and a Mayday Fund grantee (grant number AAN 11-116). The authors have no other 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 apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported in part by NIH/NIA Grant R37AG033906-12. TL Glover received support from the John A Hartford Foundation (2011–2013) as a Building Academic Geriatric Nursing Capacity Scholar and a Mayday Fund grantee (grant number AAN 11-116). The authors have no other 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 apart from those disclosed. No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.