Osteoarthritis in teenager

[MissDollyMix]

Hello, just come away from a meeting with the consultant who has diagnosed my 14 year old with osteoarthritis in his ankle, foot and possibly his knee too. There are no known risk or trigger factors. The consultant is as mystified as the rest of us why this has happened. DS is pretty upset about the diagnosis. He’s been told there isn’t much they can do but has been prescribed an intense regime of physio plus an operation plus steroid injection. I’m just trying to wrap my head around all this and educate myself. It seems it’s pretty unusual for a 14 year old to have osteoarthritis- is there anyone else out there who has been through this?

That's so unusual. You would have thought at 14 it was be another form due to a fault in the immune system but OA is just wear and tear. I know with children it's normally called juvenile arthritis.
Has he played a massive amount of sport from a young age? Still very mystifying!

Nope! Not really massively into sport! Definitely not juvenile arthritis, I asked her several times because I was surprised too. But he doesn’t have any symptoms of JA and all the symptoms of OA.

Could it be rheumatoid or psoriatic arthritis? Either which way arthritis is shockingly painful so he may have days he doesn't want to do much

Oh I forgot to say maybe stock up on compression support for ankle and knee and some cold packs (takes the pain away) and heat packs ( can help relieve the condition) I have loads of different support and use them as and when depending on the pain. He could do with a physio appt

Apologies I can see he's already got physio appointment

Did they check hips for dysplasia as this condition can create arthritis in other joints such as knees , ankles etc.

The issues are created because you learn to adjust your gait to accommodate the hips.

@Crispynoodle thank you so much for your thoughts. The rheumatology team doesn’t seem to think he has any of the autoimmune type arthritises. Thankfully he doesn’t seem to be in a massive amount of pain. It’s more his mobility that’s affected.
@Reginald123 This is one of my concerns too. I think they checked his other joints- that’s how they’ve picked up his knee problem.

I would try and get to the bottom of it as many consultants are not specialists in dysplasia and can miss it if it is mild or borderline.

However, mild dysplasia can cause other joints to misalign and create the arthritis issues in other areas. Also, if your son walks with his feet turned inwards or outwards this is another flag for a femoral problem at the top of his leg - called femoral anteversion or retroversion.

If you can I would ask for an MRI scan if they have already done an X-ray of his hips - some x-ray positions don't show mild dysplasia.

Good luck in trying to figure out the reasons behind it

Is there any family history of early onset arthritis?
A connective tissue disorder (usually inherited) is a possibility, can affect the collagen / cartilage in joints from an early age.

DH unfortunately had problems with his knee from his teens and his first surgery at 19 - but also as it has turned out much later has very significant issues with the bones in his ankle which he would always have had and they think that his very high arched feet and the whole biomechanics is the underlying issue. His grandmother had terrible osteoarthritis too (hips, knees, shoulders, finger joints replaced and re replaced) and they think there might be a connection in maybe terrible cartilage, but def not an immune arthritis

No none. Grandparents in their 70’s and 80’s but not early-onset. It’s a mystery.