Injectable Hydrogel Shows Promise as an Early-Stage Arthritis Treatment

Scientists in China have developed an injectable hydrogel aimed at treating early-stage osteoarthritis. The biomaterial is said to relieve arthritis-related discomfort and slow the condition’s progression using “hydrogel microspheres” and targeted antibodies. The therapy has so far succeeded in trials involving rats.
Affecting more than 90 million Americans at any given time, osteoarthritis is marked by the gradual breakdown of cartilage, which pads the joints and keeps the body’s movements comfortable. Without sufficient cartilage, arthritis patients find walking and performing everyday tasks difficult and painful. Today’s treatments primarily involve relieving arthritis-related pain—not resolving the arthritis itself—via over-the-counter and prescription medications, cortisone injections, and bone realignment surgery. Joint replacement surgery is the only conventional treatment to tackle arthritis directly, but it’s highly invasive and doesn’t always resolve pain long-term.
In an effort to reduce patients’ discomfort and arthritis’s long-term impact on their lives, researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Central South University sought out a lubricating solution that would also deliver collagen-protecting material. They used gelatin methacrylate (a modified version of natural gelatin protein) and sulfobetaine methacrylate (a synthetic polymer) to create incredibly small and hollow spheres, or “hydrogel microspheres.” These microspheres contain an antibody that helps the spheres attach to damaged cartilage, allowing the hydrogel to hydrate and lubricate the remaining cushioning connective tissue. 
Together, these properties should make movement more comfortable and reduce further joint damage in people with osteoarthritis. In a paper for Advanced Materials, the researchers write that injecting the hydrogel into rats with early osteoarthritis “significantly slows disease progression and reduces symptoms.” The South China Morning Post further reports that the experiment outperformed conventional arthritis treatments by more than “a third” by reducing joint friction.
There doesn’t appear to be word yet on whether the treatment will make it to human clinical trials. Meanwhile, researchers at educational institutions in the United States are working on a similarly injectable arthritis treatment that supplies degraded joints with new scaffolding, effectively reversing arthritis’s impact on the body. This, too, is in the early stages of development; still, it’s encouraging to see that new therapies for the world’s most widespread cartilage disease are just over the horizon.
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