Investigation of association between hip morphology and prevalence of osteoarthritis

The cause of hip osteoarthritis (OA) remains unclear, morphologic abnormality of hip was thought to be a contributing factor to hip OA. The hypothesis was that there were subtle anatomical morphology differences of the hip between normal and OA subjects; the objective of this study was to explore these anatomical differences which are predisposing to hip OA based on CT 3D reconstruction. Ninety-three normal subjects (186 hips) and 66 mild-to-moderate hip OA subjects (132 hips) were recruited in this study. Three parameters of the head-neck relationship were assessed: translation, rotation and concavity. Translation was the potential translational movements of femoral head related to the neck’s axis. Rotation was described by the physeal scar to evaluate the rotation tendency of femoral head related to the neck at the head-neck junction. Concavity was used to assess the sphericity of the head as it joins the neck. The femoral neck anteversion angle and some parameters of the acetabulum: anteversion, inclination and CE angle were measured too. By comparison, it was found that OA subjects had less femoral head sphericity, head-neck junction concavity, acetabular and femoral neck anteversion angle; but greater acetabular coverage. These characteristics increased the risk of hip OA in OA subjects.