Welcome FusionPhysio's Knee OA Course

Why a Knee Osteoarthritis Course?

After nearly 30 years of treating clients in private practice physiotherapy and treating hundreds with knee osteoarthritis, I’ve realized a few things:

The way you handle your knee osteoarthritis is really important!

Knee osteoarthritis (OA) is different from other injuries we treat. It tends to worsen with time as the body's natural healing mechanisms are sufficient to repair the damage. However, you can impact its progression. Whether your knee OA is mild or severe, you have a potential for improvement. Almost everyone with knee OA can to some degree reduce their pain, improve their physical activities, reduce their reliance on medications, and possibly even avoid the need for joint replacement surgery.

Our system is not set up well to help you do what truly matters.

Many people want to control their knee osteoarthritis (OA) and enhance their overall well-being, but they are unsure of the appropriate steps to take. Managing knee OA is relatively straightforward, but there is more information available than what can be discussed in a doctor or physiotherapy visit. To effectively manage knee OA in the long term, you will require additional resources beyond these appointments.

The information online can be overwhelming

To help you get information on knee osteoarthritis, you will often be given a link to some online resources. There is certainly much available online and much of it good, but it is often buried in information about the many other types of arthritis. Additionally I have found. much of the information to be laid out in a ‘shotgun’ type of approach - scattering the many different interventions and treatments at you leaving you not sure where to start or what will give you the most ‘bang for your buck’.

The information online can be misleading, or even purposefully deceptive

As mentioned there is much good information online. But there is also bad. Simply searching ‘knee osteoarthritis treatment’ online is a bit of a gamble. What you get may depend a bit on who paid for the highest spot in the google ranking. The market for knee osteoarthritis care is huge, and often a target for charlatans (maybe you’ve seen the facebook add with video of the knee cartilage regrowing with the a special heat / vibration device? ya, not gonna happen).

There is a need to put ‘meat on the bones’ of the recommended treatments

Even with great information, there is a lot of practicality missing. Questions such as where can I get help with weight loss? Who can help me with bracing? Who are the specialists in town? What product actually work best and where can I get them? All of this needs the input of experience. It is also helpful to have local community context to apply what you learn to what is available around you.

How does this course address these issues?

With these challenges in mind, I’ve created this course with some key guiding principles in mind. The FusionPhysio Knee OA course is designed to be:

Based on Published Knee Osteoarthritis Guidelines - The recommendations of this program are wholly formed around the recommendations of the evidence-based guidelines of the leading scientific organizations that extensively study and monitor the research related to knee osteoarthritis. This is all these people do and they are the ones who know best. This program draws extensively on the guidelines from such organizations as the Osteoarthritis Research Society International (OARSI), the American Association of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS), the Arthritis Society of Canada, the Arthritis Foundation, and others. Links to all of these organizations and their recommendaitons can be found in the Resources chapter.

Easy to Follow - I’ve created four pillars of Knee OA care that are easy to understand and act as ‘hooks’ to hang all of the evidence-based recommendations for knee OA care on. They are:

1. Get informed

2. Reduce the Pain

3. Reduce the Load

4. Make it Strong

These are, hopefully, easy to remember for life and at any point in your knee OA journey you can easily return to the category of care you need most where you are at.

Focussed - I’ve not included every last treatment for Knee OA that is out there, but only the ones that have the highest likelihood of helping you. I’ve also attempted to help you narrow down on the measures that are most likely to give you ‘bang for your buck’ in terms of time and resources committed by using a 4 star ‘strength of recommendation’ scale - the higher the star rating, the stronger the recommendation.

Practical - Throughout the course, I’ve tried to make the recommendations as easy to implement as possible. So where there is a recommended exercise, there is a video to show you how it’s done. Where there is a recommended product, there is a link.

Community Relevant - Medical treatment and advice always takes place in the context of a community. As such, I will reference treatments, resources, and community partners that are available in the Fraser Valley or Lower Mainland of British Columbia. If you are using this course from another area, welcome! Perhaps you can use the information to find a similar resource in your area.

Living and Evolving - by placing this information all in an online course form, it is able to evolve. If things change, or if recommendations over the years become more clear, I can quickly update it myself. This way my patients will always be up to date on the best information and resources available for Knee OA care.