Comparison of the effects of Platelet Rich Plasma (PRP) therapy on pain scores and function in early stage osteoarthritis patients with and without statin use

Objective: The aim of our study is to compare the effect of PRP treatment on pain and functional outcomes in patients with early stage osteoarthritis whether or not using statins. There are studies showing that statin and PRP have an effect on the inflammation process and arthritis. Therefore, it is aimed to retrospectively compare the pain and function scores of patients who received PRP treatment only (Group 1) and patients who were treated with PRP while using statins for hypercholesterolemia (Group 2). Material and Methods: This study is a single-center, retrospective and observational study, and the medical records of all patients who underwent PRP treatment between January 2018 and August 2020 will be retrospectively reviewed. Patients who did not use statins and received PRP treatment for osteoarthritis were determined as group 1, while patients who received PRP treatment for osteoarthritis while using statins due to hypercholesterolemia were determined as group 2. The indication for statin use of the patients in group 2 was started by the internal medicine and cardiology physicians, and they were the patients who applied to the orthopedics and traumatology outpatient clinic due to osteoarthritis while receiving statin treatment. Using patient files, patients' demographic characteristics, accompanying co-morbidities, and radiological images will be collected by the investigator responsible for patient medical records. Radiological measurements of the patients will be carried out together with the principal investigator and thesis advisor. Statistical analysis will be analyzed by the principal researcher and thesis advisor using the SPSS program. The normality of the distribution of the groups will be evaluated with the Shapiro-Wilk test. Normally distributed variables will be compared with Student's t test, and non-parametric data will be compared using Mann-Whitney U test. Results: A total of 70 patients aged 40-70 years were included in the study. A statistically significant difference was observed between the two groups before PRP was performed in the functional and anxiety score of EQ5D5L (p=0.036). Apart from this, no significant difference was observed in all parameters examined. Conclusion: In our study, it was compared whether PRP and statin had an effect against each other; no significant difference was found in terms of pain and functional scoring. In our study, although we compared the patients who underwent PRP with the patients who currently use statins and undergo PRP, it was observed that the patients were generally satisfied, their pain scores decreased and their functional scores improved.