KNEEMO · Prevention and personalized treatments in knee osteoarthritis: an Initial Training Network

Knee Osteoarthritis (KOA) is the most common chronic musculoskeletal disorder, currently affecting over 8 million people within the EU, for which currently no cure is available. Adverse biomechanics, affected through some of the major health issues of our time (ageing, obesity, sedentary lifestyle) lie at the heart of the disease.The research theme of the KNEEMO ITN is “towards targeted and tailored interventions for KOA”, and focuses on identifying the right patients for the right treatment at the right time. Research areas include anatomy, musculoskeletal modelling, prevention and early identification of patients, epidemiology, biomechanical mechanisms, and intervention studies.The KNEEMO training programme combines existing best practices from consortium members and is designed to equip researchers with skills and knowledge specific to the research field (KOA anatomy, pathology and disease mechanisms, musculoskeletal modelling, functional assessment, KOA interventions), generic research skills (epidemiology, methodology, statistics, clinimetrics, ethics), and complementary training (entrepreneurship, project management, product development, intellectual property issues). At the individual level, training will be provided through direct research project supervision and intersectoral exchange visits and secondments. At the network level, regular workshops, courses, and summer schools will be scheduled. Additionally, web-based seminars will be provided and a social media virtual learning environment will be available for continuous supervision, peer-support and expert help. Dissemination and outreach activities will also be undertaken to showcase project results and to communicate with both the scientific community and the general public to promote the importance of research and to raise public awareness of the Marie Curie Actions.