Abstract
Osteoarthritis (OA) is the most common arthritis. Early OA is treated with pain-relieving medication while advanced diseases are treated with joint replacement. Intraarticular (IA) injection has been also used as a local therapy for OA. Only corticosteroids and hyaluronic acid has been clinically used for IA injection up to now. While these drugs are effective in alleviating pain relief and mitigating inflammation, they do not regenerate damaged cartilage. We have developed drug delivery system for OA treatment using a new molecule kartogenin which are known to have regenerative effects for cartilage. These systems include kartogenin-conjugated chitosan nano/microparticles, thermoresponsive nanospheres containing kartogenin and diclofenac, hyaluronic acid hydrogel containing PEGylated kartogenin micelles. We have found that injection of these systems arrested the progression of OA as well as inhibiting inflammation in surgically-induced OA model in rats. These data will be introduced in this talk.
