16 December 2025

Weight Loss and Knee Pain: How Shedding Kilos Saves Your Joints

Can losing weight cure knee pain? We explain the science of joint loading and how weight loss acts as a natural painkiller for arthritis.

Weight Loss and Knee Pain: How Shedding Kilos Saves Your Joints

If you have knee pain and are overweight, your doctor has probably told you to lose weight.

It can feel like nagging. But it is actually the most powerful prescription we can give.


The 4x Multiplier Effect

When you walk, the force through your knee is 3 to 4 times your body weight. When you climb stairs, it is 5 to 7 times.

What does this mean?

  • If you lose 1 kg of fat, you remove 4 kg of pressure from your knee with every step.
  • If you lose 10 kg, that is 40 kg of pressure gone. Imagine carrying a 40kg cement bag all day and then putting it down. That is the relief your knees feel.

Inflammation: The Hidden Enemy

Fat is not just dead weight. Fat tissue (adipose) is active—it releases inflammatory chemicals into your blood.

  • These chemicals attack cartilage.
  • Losing fat reduces this systemic inflammation, reducing pain in all your joints.

Takeaway

You don't need to become a runway model. Losing just 5-10% of your body weight can reduce pain by 50%.

It is the cheapest, safest, and most effective treatment for knee arthritis.

Dr. Abhijit Kale

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