An official website of the United States government
National Arthritis Awareness Month — May 2018
Weekly / May 4, 2018 / 67(17);485
May is National Arthritis Awareness Month. In the United States, 54 million adults have some form of doctor-diagnosed arthritis (1), a number projected to increase to 78 million by 2040.* Approximately two thirds of adults with arthritis have overweight or obesity (1), and only 36% meet the recommended aerobic physical activity guidelines.†
Engaging in physical activity and maintaining a healthy weight can help manage arthritis symptoms.§ Physical activity can reduce arthritis pain, improve function and mood, and delay the onset of disability. Even small amounts of weight loss have been shown to significantly reduce pressure on the joints. Adults who have overweight or obesity and receive weight-loss counseling from a health care provider are approximately four times more likely to attempt to lose weight than are those who do not receive counseling (2). Health care providers can play a valuable role by counseling their patients with arthritis to be physically active, lose weight if they have overweight or obesity, and get self-management education (2,3). A report in this issue found that the percentage of health care providers counseling arthritis patients about weight loss increased significantly from 2002 to 2014 (3).
References
- Barbour KE, Helmick CG, Boring M, Brady TJ. Vital signs: prevalence of doctor-diagnosed arthritis and arthritis-attributable activity limitation—United States, 2013–2015. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2017;66:246–53. CrossRef PubMed
- Rose SA, Poynter PS, Anderson JW, Noar SM, Conigliaro J. Physician weight loss advice and patient weight loss behavior change: a literature review and meta-analysis of survey data. Int J Obes 2013;37:118–28. CrossRef PubMed
- Guglielmo D, Hootman JM, Murphy LB, et al. Health care provider counseling for weight loss among adults with arthritis and overweight or obesity—United States, 2002–2014. Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2014;2018:485–90.
Suggested citation for this article: National Arthritis Awareness Month — May 2018. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2018;67:485. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm6717a1.
MMWR and Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report are service marks of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Use of trade names and commercial sources is for identification only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services.
References to non-CDC sites on the Internet are
provided as a service to MMWR readers and do not constitute or imply
endorsement of these organizations or their programs by CDC or the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services. CDC is not responsible for the content
of pages found at these sites. URL addresses listed in MMWR were current as of
the date of publication.
All HTML versions of MMWR articles are generated from final proofs through an automated process. This conversion might result in character translation or format errors in the HTML version. Users are referred to the electronic PDF version (https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr) and/or the original MMWR paper copy for printable versions of official text, figures, and tables.
Questions or messages regarding errors in formatting should be addressed to [email protected].