Mid-life running works wonders for the knees, hips and spine
While osteoarthritis is more common after middle age, it may actually be a lack of activity that leads to osteoarthritis.
As someone who started marathon running in mid-life, I know how many aches and pains (and doubts) you can have if you take on the challenge to start running at an older age. But as an orthopaedic surgeon who has replaced thousands of worn-out hips and knees throughout my career, I also know just how much exercise actually helps the joints.
Hobbling around my orthopaedic hospital after my first marathon actually led me to do research on runners. After conducting 1,000 MRI scans of the joints of mid-life exercisers (both runners and cyclists) and “couch potatoes”, I now better understand just how beneficial mid-life running is for the knees, hips and spine.
The findings were very surprising to me, particularly in the knee study. The high-resolution MRI scans found most of the 115 middle-aged participants had abnormalities in their knees before starting marathon training. Half of these abnormalities would typically have required keyhole surgery in the past.
But none of the knee abnormalities stopped them from finishing the marathon. And, in the MRI scans conducted after the marathon, they had no signs of deterioration in their joints. This totally changes how we can advise would-be runners who are found to have an abnormality on MRI scan of their...
