What Is Osteoarthritis
It happens when the cartilage and other tissues within the joint break down due to inflammation and bone and tissue remodeling. As this happens and the cartilage wears away, the bones rub against each other with movement. This can cause the bone ends to thicken and form growths called bone spurs that interfere with the joint’s movement. Tiny fragments of bone and cartilage can move into the joint space, and cysts can form in the bone, also preventing your joint from moving freely.
What Causes Osteoarthritis
Before getting into the potential causes of osteoarthritis, it’s important to note that the condition is categorized as either primary or secondary osteoarthritis.
Currently, experts don’t know exactly what causes primary osteoarthritis, but it occurs when the cartilage over the joints breaks down. This was believed to be due to regular wear and tear on the joints as we age, but research in recent years has shown a significant metabolic component and linked it to metabolic syndrome (Zhang, et al., 2024).
Metabolic syndrome includes obesity, hypertension (high blood pressure), dyslipidemia (high lipids in the blood), and diabetes. All of these are known to drive inflammation and cartilage breakdown.
Osteoarthritis can also be caused by anything that damages your joints, including sports injuries, surgical procedures, and accidents, as well as underlying medical conditions that affect the joints.
While these things can’t always be prevented, many of these causes and risk factors can be.
Who Is at Risk
Anyone can develop osteoarthritis, but there are several known risk factors, some of which are preventable.
Age is a known risk factor, particularly being over 55 and postmenopausal. Having other types of arthritis, including rheumatoid arthritis, gout, and psoriatic arthritis, also raises a person’s risk, as does having a family history of it. Some autoimmune disorders that affect the joints also increase your risk of osteoarthritis, including celiac disease, Crohn’s disease, and ankylosing spondylitis (Dan, et al., 2024).
Metabolic syndrome and the conditions involved also raise the risk of osteoarthritis. These include obesity, high cholesterol, high blood sugar levels, and high triglycerides, all of which increase inflammation, which can damage your joints (Zhang, et al., 2024). Being overweight also places extra stress on the joints, especially the knees.
What Are the Symptoms
Osteoarthritis symptoms can vary in how severe they are and which part of the body they affect. At first, some people may have stiffness and pain in one or more joints, while others are most affected by joint pain and stiffness in the knees or hips, or stiffness and grinding sounds when moving the neck. As the damage progresses, this can lead to changes in the shape of the joints, trouble gripping things, or a decrease in range of motion.
Common osteoarthritis symptoms include:
Joint pain that’s often worse when you’re moving the joint
Joint stiffness which you may notice most when you first get up in the morning or after resting
Decreased range of motion
Swelling around the joint
Changes to a joint’s appearance
A feeling of joint looseness or instability
Grinding or scraping noise when moving the joint(s)
How Is Osteoarthritis Diagnosed
There is no single test to diagnose osteoarthritis. Instead, your doctor will use your medical history, exams, and tests to confirm that’s what’s causing your symptoms.
Medical history
The first step in diagnosing osteoarthritis is a review of your medical history, including your symptoms, your personal and family history of medical conditions, and any medications you are taking. They will also ask about previous injuries and your lifestyle.
Physical exam
Your doctor will likely want to perform a physical exam to get a better picture of your overall state of health, as well as check your joints and reflexes.
Imaging
Depending on your symptoms and any joint issues identified during your physical exam, your doctor might order imaging, such as X-rays to look for signs of joint damage and changes to your bone. They may also recommend an MRI to look at the tissues around your joints.
Blood tests
Your doctor may order blood tests to rule out other conditions that can cause similar symptoms. This includes blood tests to check for inflammation, rheumatoid arthritis, and gout.
Joint fluid analysis
Also called synovial fluid analysis, your doctor may want to take samples of the synovial fluid that cushions your joints to check for signs of osteoarthritis and other types of arthritis, infection, and excess fluid in the joint.
How Is Osteoarthritis Treated with Regenerative Therapies
Regenerative treatments, while still considered experimental in the U.S., continue to show tremendous promise in the treatment of osteoarthritis.
Instead of just managing your symptoms, regenerative therapies for osteoarthritis can help rebuild cartilage, tendons, and other tissues, and improve joint lubrication to improve the joint’s health and function (Kim et al., 2025). Some of these include stem cell injections, PRP (platelet rich plasma) injections, and micro-fragmented adipose tissue (MFAT) injections.
PRP therapy is currently the most used regenerative therapy for osteoarthritis. While some report mixed results, many practitioners consider it to be an effective, minimally invasive treatment for knee osteoarthritis and other tissue injuries. A large 2025 meta-analysis showed that PRP provided significant functional improvement from 1 to 12 months, and pain improvement between 3 and 6 months compared to placebo. Researchers also found that higher concentrations of platelets offered better relief (Bensa et al., 2025).
A 2023 single-blind, randomized controlled study on the effects of different types of stem cells on knee osteoarthritis found that mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) provided the same benefits as corticosteroid injections (Mautner et al., 2023).
Most of the research into regenerative treatments for osteoarthritis has so far focused on osteoarthritis of the knee, but research into treatments on other joints is ongoing with equally promising results. A 2022 clinical study found that MFAT combined with PRP injections were equally effective in improving pain and joint function in people with hip arthritis over 6 to 12 months (Heidari, et al., 2022).
To get the most of treatment, regenerative therapies may be combined or used alongside lifestyle changes and conventional treatments for a plan tailored to your unique needs.
What Are Possible Complications
Osteoarthritis can have a significant impact on your quality of life and increase your risk of developing other chronic health conditions.
The pain, stiffness, and impact on the joint’s range of motion can make it difficult to exercise and interfere with your day-to-day activities. As the damage progresses and changes the joint structure, a joint replacement may be necessary. Also, if osteoarthritis prevents you from getting enough exercise, it can increase your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and even some types of cancer. Fortunately, getting risk factors under control with lifestyle changes and treatment to improve joint health may help slow disease progression.
Can Osteoarthritis Be Prevented
Osteoarthritis can’t always be prevented, but you can reduce your risk and delay progression by addressing the many modifiable metabolic factors that increase inflammation in the body and wear down cartilage.
These include:
Weight management
Achieving and maintaining a healthy weight can reduce systemic inflammation, which is known to cause the breakdown of cartilage. Losing weight also reduces the amount of stress on your joints.
Nutrition changes
It’s not just about eating a healthier diet but also prioritizing nutrients that support cartilage synthesis. This includes vitamins B and C, niacinamide, omega-3, and sulfur compounds, including glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate.
Exercise
Staying active doesn’t only help you maintain a healthy weight—it also strengthens the muscles and ligaments that support your joints, increases circulation, and helps circulate synovial fluid in your joints to keep them moving freely.
Exercise also reduces inflammation and signals your stem cells to turn into bone-building cells rather than fat cells (Deng, et al., 2023).
Takeaway
Osteoarthritis is not just a byproduct of getting older—it has a metabolic component and is driven by inflammation in the body. The good news? Many of the risk factors, like obesity and nutrition, can be addressed and combined with regenerative treatment to help your body repair itself.
