title: Current and future impact of osteoarthritis on health care: a population-based study with projections to year 2032.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To estimate the current and future (to year 2032) impact of osteoarthritis (OA) health care seeking.
  
  
  METHODS
  Population-based study with prospectively ascertained data from the Skåne Healthcare Register (SHR), Sweden, encompassing more than 15 million person-years of primary and specialist outpatient care and hospitalizations. We studied all Skåne region residents aged ≥45 by the end of 2012 (n = 531, 254) and determined the prevalence of doctor-diagnosed OA defined as the proportion of the prevalent population that had received a diagnosis of OA of the knee, hip, hand, or other locations except the spine between 1999 and 2012. We projected consultation prevalence of OA until year 2032 using Statistics Sweden's (SCB) projected age and sex structure and prevalence of overweight and obesity.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In 2012 the proportion of population aged ≥45 with any doctor-diagnosed OA was 26.6% (95% confidence interval (CI): 26.5-26.8) (men 22.4%, women 30.5%). The most common locations were knee (13.8%), hip (5.8%) and hand (3.1%). Of the prevalent cases 26.8% had OA in multiple joints. By the year 2032, the proportion of the population aged ≥45 with doctor-diagnosed OA is estimated to increase from 26.6% to 29.5% (any location), from 13.8% to 15.7% for the knee and 5.8-6.9% for the hip.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In 2032, at least an additional 26,000 individuals per 1 million population aged ≥45 years are estimated to have consulted a physician for OA in a peripheral joint compared to 2012. These findings underscore the need to address modifiable risk factors and develop new effective OA treatments.
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, Clinical Sciences Lund, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; Epidemiology and Register Centre South, Skåne University Hospital, Lund, Sweden. Electronic address: aleksandra.turkiewicz@med.lu.se.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Turkiewicz
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, Clinical Sciences Lund, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; Epidemiology and Register Centre South, Skåne University Hospital, Lund, Sweden. Electronic address: ingemar.petersson@med.lu.se.
authors.forename: I F
authors.initials: IF
authors.lastname: Petersson
authors.affiliation: Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; R&D Centre Skåne, Lund University Hospital, Lund, Sweden. Electronic address: jonas.bjork@skane.se.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Björk
authors.affiliation: Women's College Hospital and the Institute for Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Electronic address: gillian.hawker@wchospital.ca.
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Hawker
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, Clinical Sciences Lund, Lund University, Lund, Sweden. Electronic address: leif.dahlberg@med.lu.se.
authors.forename: L E
authors.initials: LE
authors.lastname: Dahlberg
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, Clinical Sciences Lund, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; Research Unit for Musculoskeletal Function and Physiotherapy, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark; Department of Orthopedics and Traumatology, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark. Electronic address: stefan.lohmander@med.lu.se.
authors.forename: L S
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Lohmander
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, Clinical Sciences Lund, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; Epidemiology and Register Centre South, Skåne University Hospital, Lund, Sweden; Clinical Epidemiology Research and Training Unit, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA, USA. Electronic address: martin.englund@med.lu.se.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Englund
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000639:trends*; D005260:Female; D005544:Forecasting; D014943:Global Health; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010003:Osteoarthritis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011159:Population Surveillance; D015995:Prevalence; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors
keywords: Epidemiology; Knee osteoarthritis; Osteoarthritis