In medicine

Medicine

Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....

, Chondropathy refers to a disease of the cartilage

Cartilage

Cartilage is a flexible connective tissue found in many areas in the bodies of humans and other animals, including the joints between bones, the rib cage, the ear, the nose, the elbow, the knee, the ankle, the bronchial tubes and the intervertebral discs...

. It is frequently divided into 5 grades, with 0-2 defined as normal, and 3-4 defined as diseased.

Cartilage diseases

Some common diseases affecting/involving the cartilage are listed below.

• Osteoarthritis
  Osteoarthritis
  Osteoarthritis also known as degenerative arthritis or degenerative joint disease, is a group of mechanical abnormalities involving degradation of joints, including articular cartilage and subchondral bone. Symptoms may include joint pain, tenderness, stiffness, locking, and sometimes an effusion...
  
  : The cartilage covering bones (articular cartilage) is thinned, eventually completely worn out, resulting in a "bone against bone" joint, resulting in pain and reduced mobility. Osteoarthritis is very common, affects the joints exposed to high stress and is therefore considered the result of "wear and tear" rather than a true disease. It is treated by Arthroplasty
  Arthroplasty
  Arthroplasty is an operative procedure of orthopedic surgery performed, in which the arthritic or dysfunctional joint surface is replaced with something better or by remodeling or realigning the joint by osteotomy or some other procedure.-Background:Previously, a popular form of arthroplasty was...
  
  , the replacement of the joint by a synthetic joint made of titanium and teflon. Chondroitin sulfate
  Chondroitin sulfate
  Chondroitin sulfate is a sulfated glycosaminoglycan composed of a chain of alternating sugars . It is usually found attached to proteins as part of a proteoglycan. A chondroitin chain can have over 100 individual sugars, each of which can be sulfated in variable positions and quantities...
  
  , a monomer of the polysaccharide
  Polysaccharide
  Polysaccharides are long carbohydrate molecules, of repeated monomer units joined together by glycosidic bonds. They range in structure from linear to highly branched. Polysaccharides are often quite heterogeneous, containing slight modifications of the repeating unit. Depending on the structure,...
  
   portion of proteoglycan
  Proteoglycan
  Proteoglycans are proteins that are heavily glycosylated. The basic proteoglycan unit consists of a "core protein" with one or more covalently attached glycosaminoglycan chain. The point of attachment is a Ser residue to which the glycosaminoglycan is joined through a tetrasaccharide bridge...
  
  , has been shown to reduce the symptoms of osteoarthritis
  Osteoarthritis
  Osteoarthritis also known as degenerative arthritis or degenerative joint disease, is a group of mechanical abnormalities involving degradation of joints, including articular cartilage and subchondral bone. Symptoms may include joint pain, tenderness, stiffness, locking, and sometimes an effusion...
  
  , possibly by increasing the synthesis
  Biosynthesis
  Biosynthesis is an enzyme-catalyzed process in cells of living organisms by which substrates are converted to more complex products. The biosynthesis process often consists of several enzymatic steps in which the product of one step is used as substrate in the following step...
  
   of the extracellular matrix.

• Achondroplasia
  Achondroplasia
  Achondroplasia dwarfism occurs as a sporadic mutation in approximately 85% of cases or may be inherited in an autosomal dominant genetic disorder that is a common cause of dwarfism...
  
  : Reduced proliferation of chondrocytes in the epiphyseal plate
  Epiphyseal plate
  The epiphyseal plate is a hyaline cartilage plate in the metaphysis at each end of a long bone...
  
   of long bones during infancy and childhood, resulting in dwarfism.

• Costochondritis
  Costochondritis
  Costochondritis is a benign inflammation of the costal cartilage, which is a length of cartilage which connects each rib, except the eleventh and twelfth, to the sternum. It causes pain in the chest that can be reproduced by pressing on the affected area between the ribs. This pain can be quite...
  
  : Inflammation of cartilage in the ribs, causing chest pain.

• Spinal disc herniation
  Spinal disc herniation
  A spinal disc herniation , informally and misleadingly called a "slipped disc", is a medical condition affecting the spine due to trauma, lifting injuries, or idiopathic, in which a tear in the outer, fibrous ring of an intervertebral disc allows the soft, central portion A spinal disc herniation...
  
  : Asymmetrical compression of an intervertebral disc ruptures the sac-like disc, causing a herniation of its soft content. The hernia compresses the adjacent nerves and causes back pain.

• Relapsing polychondritis: a destruction, probably autoimmune, of cartilage, especially of the nose and ears, causing disfiguration. Death occurs by suffocation as the larynx loses its rigidity and collapses.

• Cartilage tumors

Repairing articular cartilage damage

Though articular cartilage damage is not life threatening, it does strongly affect the quality of life. Articular cartilage damage is often the cause of severe pain, swellings, strong barries to mobility and severe restrictions to the patient's activities. Over the last decades, however, surgeons and biotech ventures have elaborated promising procedures that contribute to articular cartilage repair

Articular cartilage repair

The aim of an articular cartilage repair treatment is to restore the surface of an articular joint's hyaline cartilage. Over the last decades, surgeons and researchers have been working hard to elaborate surgical cartilage repair interventions...

. These procedures do not, however, treat osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis also known as degenerative arthritis or degenerative joint disease, is a group of mechanical abnormalities involving degradation of joints, including articular cartilage and subchondral bone. Symptoms may include joint pain, tenderness, stiffness, locking, and sometimes an effusion...

.

External links

• The KNEEguru - educational site packed with knee content with sections on articular cartilage problems
• http://www.sportsmed.org/sml/document.asp?did=77 American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine
• http://www.steadman-hawkins.com/knee_chondral/overview.asp The Steadman-Hawkins Clinic