Association of hip pain with radiographic evidence of hip osteoarthritis: diagnostic test study
Four articles on PainSci cite Kim 2015: 1. Massage Therapy for Back Pain, Hip Pain, and Sciatica 2. The Complete Guide to IT Band Syndrome 3. Your Back Is Not Out of Alignment 4. IT Band Pain is Knee Pain, Not Hip Pain
PainSci commentary on Kim 2015: ?This page is one of thousands in the PainScience.com bibliography. It is not a general article: it is focused on a single scientific paper, and it may provide only just enough context for the summary to make sense. Links to other papers and more general information are provided wherever possible.
This analysis of thousands of patients confirmed a jarring disconnect between signs of arthritis on hip x-rays and hip pain: “Hip pain was not present in many hips with radiographic osteoarthritis, and many hips with pain did not show radiographic hip osteoarthritis.” What they mean by “many” is “practically all”: roughly 80% of patients with signs of arthritis had no pain, and at least 85% of patients with hip pain had no sign of arthritis! These numbers held up even at the extremes — most older patients with a high suspicion of hip arthritis did not in fact have arthritis that could be diagnosed with an x-ray.
original abstract †Abstracts here may not perfectly match originals, for a variety of technical and practical reasons. Some abstacts are truncated for my purposes here, if they are particularly long-winded and unhelpful. I occasionally add clarifying notes. And I make some minor corrections.
STUDY QUESTION: Is there concordance between hip pain and radiographic hip osteoarthritis?
METHODS: In this diagnostic test study, pelvic radiographs were assessed for hip osteoarthritis in two cohorts: the Framingham Osteoarthritis Study (community of Framingham, Massachusetts) and the Osteoarthritis Initiative (a multicenter longitudinal cohort study of osteoarthritis in the United States). Using visual representation of the hip joint, participants reported whether they had hip pain on most days and the location of the pain: anterior, groin, lateral, buttocks, or low back. In the Framingham study, participants with hip pain were also examined for hip pain with internal rotation. The authors analysed the agreement between radiographic hip osteoarthritis and hip pain, and for those with hip pain suggestive of hip osteoarthritis they calculated the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value of radiographs as the diagnostic test.
STUDY ANSWER AND LIMITATIONS: In the Framingham study (n=946), only 15.6% of hips in patients with frequent hip pain showed radiographic evidence of hip osteoarthritis, and 20.7% of hips with radiographic hip osteoarthritis were frequently painful. The sensitivity of radiographic hip osteoarthritis for hip pain localised to the groin was 36.7%, specificity 90.5%, positive predictive value 6.0%, and negative predictive value 98.9%. Results did not differ much for hip pain at other locations or for painful internal rotation. In the Osteoarthritis Initiative study (n=4366), only 9.1% of hips in patients with frequent pain showed radiographic hip osteoarthritis, and 23.8% of hips with radiographic hip osteoarthritis were frequently painful. The sensitivity of definite radiographic hip osteoarthritis for hip pain localised to the groin was 16.5%, specificity 94.0%, positive predictive value 7.1%, and negative predictive value 97.6%. Results also did not differ much for hip pain at other locations.
WHAT THIS STUDY ADDS: Hip pain was not present in many hips with radiographic osteoarthritis, and many hips with pain did not show radiographic hip osteoarthritis. Most older participants with a high suspicion for clinical hip osteoarthritis (groin or anterior pain and/or painful internal rotation) did not have radiographic hip osteoarthritis, suggesting that in many cases, hip osteoarthritis might be missed if diagnosticians relied solely on hip radiographs.
This page is part of the PainScience BIBLIOGRAPHY, which contains plain language summaries of thousands of scientific papers & others sources. It’s like a highly specialized blog. A few highlights:
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