7/7/10 A new study is putting people who have chronic low back pain on notice: If you are considering taking the dietary supplement glucosamine to relieve your symptoms, it probably won’t help.
“Our study answers the question of whether everybody with chronic low back pain should use glucosamine, and the answer is no,” says study author Philip Wilkens, a research fellow and chiropractor at of Oslo University Hospital, in Norway.
Low back pain is the second most common complaint brought to the attention of primary care doctors.
Glucosamine, when naturally produced by the body, helps create cartilage and keep it healthy. Wilkens says that in laboratory tests, glucosamine has appeared to have anti-inflammatory properties and may even help to regenerate cartilage; and though some human studies have replicated those results, others have not. As a dietary supplement, however, its use has become somewhat controversial, as a growing number of studies have begun to call its effectiveness into doubt.
He says questions have also been raised about different brands of the dietary supplement and whether they contain the recommended dose of glucosamine.
For the current study, which was published in the July 7, 2010 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers enrolled 250 patients who were at least 25 years old and who had been experiencing pain due to osteoarthritis, or OA, in their lower spine for more than six months.
Half of the study participants got 1,500 milligrams of glucosamine daily for six months. The other half got a placebo. After six months, and then again at one year, researchers found no difference in pain, disability or quality of life between the two groups.
Interestingly, both groups said their pain improved by an average of about 50 percent over the course of the study. Experts think that may be due to a placebo effect – participants expected to feel better, so they did; or to the fact that back pain often improves on its own over time.
Despite these study results, Wilkens says he knows plenty of doctors and patients claim the dietary supplement is effective and he says there may be a reason for that.
“Therapies may have an effect on an individual level not picked up by research as it is conducted today,” Wilkens says.
My father, who is in his 70's and is althetic like he is still in his 30's, recommend the Dr. Max Power Joint Support with Vitamin B12 - its glucosamine and MSM supplement. I was shocked. In two weeks I was literally pain free, for the first time in years. My back feels better than it has since 1995. The pain is non-existent, and what little there occasionally is resolves with a little stretching. My shoulder, while still clearly injured, has significantly less pain and a vastly increased range of motion. I no longer scream when I pick up the milk jug or my three year old daughter. Overall, I feel better and am in a much sunnier mood.
I also have been dignoised with arthritis in my spine a heating pad does help each night and taking Glucosamine & Chrodtrin & vit D
does hekp with pain and swelling and just watch your diet what you eat cannot be a major difference like eating aonly wheats products and fruits .
which causes Siatic pain in my legs. Is there anything I can do for it?
When a larger group test is performed, please let me know the results.
I am getting younger and younger people into my Arthritis water aerobics class.
One 17 year old just had 2 disks repaired. What are you advising to stop the process of degragation in the back?
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