TOPHIP: Topical NSAIDs in the Treatment of Hip Osteoarthritis
Research type
Research Study
Full title
How Effective are Topical NSAIDs in the Treatment of Hip Osteoarthritis: An In Vivo Study in Patients Undergoing Total Hip Arthroplasty
IRAS ID
217380
Contact name
Robert Middleton
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Royal Bournemouth and Christchurch Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Eudract number
2017-000178-13
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 5 months, 27 days
Research summary
Creams or gels containing anti-inflammatories have shown benefit for patients suffering pain due to arthritis of the hands and knees. As they are applied to the skin, they do not subject the patient to side effects (such as gastric ulcers or kidney failure). There is little evidence for the use of anti-inflammatory cream in the treatment of arthritis of the hip, hence it was not recommended in the recent NICE guidelines. This study proposes to explore this issue. One of the reasons creams have not been used on the hip is an assumption that the joint is too deep for the drug to penetrate. This assumption has never been tested and this study seeks to do that: does the active drug from an anti-inflammatory cream reach the hip joint?
We intend to ask patients undergoing a total hip replacement to use the cream regularly for three days prior to surgery. At the time of operation some fluid and tissue is removed routinely to perform the operation, we will use this tissue to measure how much drug has reached the hip joint. An advantage of creams is that they don’t spread round the whole body, but we will also take a blood sample from patients at the time of surgery to make sure this is the case in our study. Once we know whether the drug reaches the hip joint, we can look at performing clinical trials to see how effective the drug is for people with different severity levels of arthritis.REC name
South Central - Oxford C Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/SC/0074
Date of REC Opinion
9 Mar 2017
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion