Hillary Jayne Braun1, Melissa A. Vogelsong1,2,
Ernesto Staroswiecki1,3, Brian A. Hargreaves1, Neal
Bangerter4, Eric Han5, Jill Fattor6, Anne L.
Friedlander7, Omer Shah8, Jacquie M. Beaubien9,
Garry Evan Gold1
1Radiology, Stanford
University, Stanford, CA, United States; 2UCSF School of Medicine;
3Electrical Engineering, Stanford University; 4Electrical
Engineering, Brigham Young University; 5GE Healthcare Global
Applied Sciences Laboratory, Menlo Park, CA; 6Stanford Center on
Longevity, Stanford University, Stanford, CA; 7VA Palo Alto
Healthcare Center, Palo Alto, CA; 8Georgetown University School of
Medicine; 9Psychology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
Arthritis Relief Plus (ARP) Cream has been previously shown to relieve joint pain. In this study, MRI was used to evaluate the knees of eight (5 experimental, 3 placebo) osteoarthritic patients before and after a twelve-week course of topical ARP Cream application. T2, T1ρ, and sodium imaging techniques were used to assess the macromolecule content of cartilage. Significant decreases in T1ρ relaxation times and increases sodium signal in the medial femoral condyle regions of the experimental group suggests there may be a benefit to ARP Cream application. However, results should be interpreted with caution due to the small sample size.