Simple tasks such as opening a jar, turning a key, buttoning a shirt, or holding someone’s hand can become very painful for people with hand osteoarthritis.
This common condition affects the small joints in the hands and can cause pain, swelling, stiffness, and weaker grip strength. Over time, it may make everyday activities much harder and reduce a person’s independence.
Osteoarthritis develops when the smooth cartilage that protects the ends of bones slowly wears away.
Without this protective layer, the bones rub against each other, leading to pain and reduced movement.
Hand osteoarthritis becomes more common with age and is especially common in women after menopause, although younger adults can also develop the condition.
Researchers estimate that by the age of 85, almost half of women and about one in four men will experience hand osteoarthritis. Although the disease affects millions of people around the world, treatment choices remain limited. Most patients use pain-relieving medicines, anti-inflammatory creams, hand exercises, or supportive devices, but these treatments often do not provide enough relief or slow the disease.
A research team from Monash University and Alfred Health wanted to see whether an older medicine could help people with this condition. The study was led by Professor Flavia Cicuttini and focused on methotrexate, a medicine that has been widely used since the 1980s to treat rheumatoid arthritis and several other inflammatory diseases. In those illnesses, the drug reduces harmful inflammation by calming the body’s immune response.
The researchers carried out a clinical trial involving people with painful hand osteoarthritis. Participants received either 20 milligrams of methotrexate once a week or a placebo, which looked the same but contained no active medicine. The team followed the participants for six months and regularly measured their pain and stiffness.
The results showed that people taking methotrexate experienced greater improvements in pain and stiffness than those taking the placebo. Their symptoms continued to improve throughout the study instead of leveling off after a short time. These findings suggest that methotrexate could provide lasting symptom relief for some people with hand osteoarthritis.
The researchers say more work is still needed before the medicine becomes a standard treatment for this condition. Future studies will examine how long the benefits last, the safest and most effective dose, and whether the drug can slow damage inside the joints instead of only easing symptoms.
This research may be especially important for women after menopause because the risk of hand osteoarthritis increases during this stage of life.
A safe, affordable treatment could help many people stay active, continue working, and carry out daily tasks with less pain. The study was published in The Lancet, offering new hope that a well-known medicine may soon improve life for millions living with hand osteoarthritis.
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