Updates in Osteoarthritis: Research Provides Insights into Molecular Pathogenesis of OA

“This has turned pathogenesis on its head and suggests it’s a disease primarily due to failed repair rather than driven by mechano-inflammatory pathways,” she explained.

Having said this, Dr. Vincent also shared findings related to retinoic acid—specifically, that retinoic acid is maintained at high levels in healthy chondrocytes but drops rapidly upon cartilage injury.⁸ Using talarozole, a drug that boosts retinoic acid levels in the cell, mechanoflammation could be suppressed in vitro through a peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma-dependent manner, and was able to suppress OA in mice.

Talarozole has been tested in phase 2 clinical trials in other diseases and has an acceptable safety profile, so these results raise the possibility that this drug could be tested in OA patients, Dr. Vincent concluded.⁹

Vanessa Caceres is a medical writer in Bradenton, Fla.

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