Ginger extract alleviates pain of osteoarthritis

A new study found that for patients with arthritis, high-purity ginger extract bone can improve their knee pain symptoms Dr K C marcussen of Narayana Institute, Wisconsin, USA, selected 247 patients with osteoarthritis with knee joint symptoms and randomly divided them into two groups They were treated with ginger extract twice a day and placebo respectively for 6 weeks The results showed that after the treatment, the percentage of patients with standing pain significantly improved in the treatment group was significantly higher than that in the placebo group (P = 0.048), and the reduction of average pain during standing and walking was also significant in the treatment group (P = 0.005 and P = 0.016) The overall evaluation of patients in the treatment group was better than that in the placebo group, and the number of times medical assistance was needed in the treatment group was less than that in the placebo group, the researchers noted However, there was no significant difference in quality of life between the two groups Side effects of gastrointestinal tract were also more common in the treatment group than in the placebo group, but most of the symptoms were mild In their comments, Dr Donald M Marcus and Maria E Suarez almazor of Houston University School of medicine pointed out that ginger's efficacy in this study was limited and not lasting Moreover, it is not reliable to take standing pain as a main evaluation index, because WOMAC is a typical and commonly used index to evaluate the treatment effect of osteoarthritis, and there is no significant difference between the two groups in this study Therefore, it is not appropriate to recommend ginger as a drug for the treatment of arthritis.