Honey Injections Used to Treat Osteoarthritis

Intraarticular Injection of Honey in Treatment of Hip Osteoarthritis: A Case Study

By Mamdouh Abdulrhman, Professor of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt

E-Mail: mamdouh565@hotmail.com, mamdouh_abdulmaksoud22@yahoo.com, mamdouh.abdelrhman@gmail.com

A 56-year-old farmer came to my office on June 22, 2006, seeking for an alternative treatment for his right hip joint pain, which had been present for about 10 years. The condition was diagnosed as severe osteoarthritis of the right hip joint; based on symptoms (pain and limitation of movement) and radiological findings.

The patient did not show favorable response to different pharmacological treatment modalities and the pain and disability limited his ability to do his regular physical activities as a farmer. Moreover he started to experience gastrointestinal problems (e.g., epigastric pain) as side effects to the medications.

Ultimately he was advised by an orthopedic surgeon to do arthroplasty (total hip replacement) because of persistence of symptoms and disability despite appropriate treatment, but he refused. After getting consent, he stopped all medications and started to receive honey injections into the affected hip.

Intraarticular honey injection every 2 to 4 weeks has been started since July 6, 2006, and is still ongoing. Honey solution (5 ml) was initially given in a concentration of 10% and thereafter the concentration was gradually increased to 30%.

The pain and joint function started to show improvement from the 2nd injection. A total of 35 honey injections were given to the patient without any significant side effects. During each honey injection the patient experienced hip pain which usually persists for a few hours and disappears spontaneously: this was followed by improvement in both symptoms and function of the joint which usually persist for about 10 days or more. In conclusion; honey injection should be used in future clinical trials in treatment of this disabling disease.