Arthritis sufferers who participate in three weeks of intensive exercise therapy after being hospitalized for their disease enjoy a better quality of life a full year after the treatment than those who don’t, Dutch researchers report.

And the exercise program actually saves money compared to standard care, Dr. Louise M. A. Braakman-Jansen of the University of Twente in Enschede and colleagues found.

Arthritis patients often experience a decline in function while in the hospital, the researchers note in a report in the medical journal, Arthritis and Rheumatism. Yet there is no standard treatment for these patients after hospital discharge for a disease flare-up or for joint replacement surgery.

Braakman-Jansen and colleagues had previously shown that an intensive exercise training program consisting of two daily 75-minute training sessions along with a twice-weekly group education program was helpful for patients.

They conducted the current study to compare the cost-effectiveness of the program with standard care. Eighty-five patients, including 50 who participated in the exercise training program and 35 who received standard care, were included in their analysis.

Societal costs for the exercise program were 718 Euros ($1,087 dollars) lower per year than for standard care, the researchers found.

Most of the greater costs in the standard care group were due to patients who had been referred to nursing homes immediately after their hospitalization. Moreover, patients in the standard care group who required a second joint replacement surgery also spent more time in the hospital, on average, than those who had the exercise training program.

These findings, the researchers say, show that intensive exercise therapy should be offered to all patients with arthritis after being discharged from the hospital, especially patients with symptoms in multiple joints.

SOURCE: Arthritis & Rheumatism, February 15, 2008.