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Glossary

Operational definitions of the terms used across the Observatory.

Osteoarthritis: Joint disease characterised by changes in cartilage and subchondral bone, with functional impact.
Randomisation: Random allocation of participants to a treatment group to reduce bias.
Blinding: Procedure by which participants and/or assessors do not know the group allocation.
Confidence interval: Plausible range within which the true effect estimated by a study lies.
MCID: Minimum clinically important difference perceived by the patient.
Placebo: Intervention without specific effect used as a comparator in trials.
PRP: Platelet-rich plasma; autologous preparation injected into the joint.
Bias: Systematic error that distorts study results.