For millions of people living with knee osteoarthritis, the current treatment ladder has a frustrating middle step that is largely empty. Conservative measures — physical therapy, NSAIDs, corticosteroid injections — provide relief that wanes over months. Full joint replacement surgery is effective but invasive, carries surgical risks, requires weeks of rehabilitation, and comes with a prosthetic lifespan of 15 to 20 years, making it poorly suited for younger or less medically robust patients who face decades of living with arthritis.
Between those two rungs is a gap that has driven years of research into minimally invasive interventional options. A study published June 16, 2026, in Radiology — the flagship journal of the Radiological Society of North America — now provides the strongest evidence yet that one of those options delivers a full year of meaningful pain relief and functional improvement for appropriately selected patients.
