> > This was an observational study where people chose whether or not they wanted to run; therefore there is always the possibility that people stopped running because they had knee pain.
> That's a pretty big flaw in their study.
How do you figure? These people are accounted for in the data. Regardless of why people stopped running, they have better outcomes than never-runners. E.g.:
> Any history of running was associated with less frequent knee pain (table 2) in the unadjusted and adjusted models compared to those who never ran.
All runners who run regularly will eventually develop knee or ankle pain. It's sort of normal for semi-serious distance runners to own a pair of crutches. I'm not saying all of them, but, if you need a pair of crutches, ask your friends who run and one of them will have a pair.
But, your knee can hurt for a while without it turning into joint problems.
> This was an observational study where people chose whether or not they wanted to run; therefore there is always the possibility that people stopped running because they had knee pain. As such, we cannot comment upon the influence of compulsory running on overall knee health.
so... forced running might cause osteoarthritis. But, if you feel like going for a run and it doesn't hurt, it's not going to cause joint problems.
> Our study findings add to the existing literature by including a large sample within which we were able to assess the influence of running in people who participated in running for shorter amounts of time and perhaps stopped running in a cohort that had high quality of assessments of symptoms and standardized radiographs. We found that runners in this group were not at a higher risk for symptomatic knee OA.
The study itself says:
> This was an observational study where people chose whether or not they wanted to run; therefore there is always the possibility that people stopped running because they had knee pain.
That's a pretty big flaw in their study.