It is believed that it is often impossible to crunch with your fingers - this habit can lead to premature joint diseases. We checked whether this is really so.

In the Russian media, information about the danger of such a habit Appears Often: supposedly it can lead to arthrosis. Here, for example, what told About this Sputnik radio station last year:

“... multiple clicking leads to instability, which is why the joints are spanning. This, in turn, leads to their soon wear and arthrosis.

"If you will spin the joints all the time, you will receive arthrosis at the age of 50, which should be at the age of 70," the orthopedist Konstantin] Ternova ensured. "

Many believe that it is harmful to crunch with fingers, back and neck, because the joints are damaged because of this and arthrosis develops gradually in a person. In order to figure out whether this is really so, you need to find out where the crunch itself is taken from and whether it can affect the possibility of arthritis.

The fact is that, although scientists have been engaged in a crunch in the joints for decades, they still have not managed to explain the mechanism for the appearance of sound. There are two main hypotheses, from where a crunch is taken in the joints.

The first hypothesis appeared Back in 1971. Each joint has the so -called joint cavity, and it contains a small amount of synovial fluid, which performs the function of lubrication and prevents the wear of the joints. About 15% of this lubricant - Not a liquid, but a gas. According to the theory, during manipulations in the joints, the process of cavitation occurs: the gas usually dissolved in the liquid turns into bubbles, and then immediately collapses. This is what leads to a characteristic sound. Therefore, at some point after a long lesson, the joints may stop crunching: when all the bubbles are collapsed, it takes some time for the gas to disappear again in the liquid and the process could be started again.

There are many ways to crunch with fingers / Flickr, by Lollyknit

In 2015, PLOS ONE magazine Published article with the second hypothesis. In the study, the authors observed crunching joints through an MRI. With the help of the experiment, they showed that the sound does not appear because of the previously existing gas bubbles, but because of the expansion of the joint cavity itself as a result of the joint manipulation.

Although this version seemed to refute the theory of bubbles, in 2018 everything is again Rolked over: Another group of scientists using a mathematical model showed that the sound should create precisely gas bubbles. “Despite more than 60 years of study, there is still no consent from where the sound of crispy joints is taken - there are not enough experimental evidence,” the authors write.

In short, where the articular crunch comes from, is not yet known. But the scientists also failed to find evidence that the habit of crunching with joints can lead to arthrosis.

For example, c research 1975 out of 15 patients who reported the habit of crunching joints, only one was diagnosed with arthrosis. In another 1990 study Participated Already 300 people, but the scientists again found any connection between the habit of crunching with fingers and arthrosis.

The idea of arthrosis was checked and using X -ray. In 2011, one of the studies compared pictures of people with diagnosed arthrosis aged 50–89 years and those who had no illness. The prevalence of arthrosis among those who had the habit of crunching with knuckles, and those who did not do this turned out to be approximately the same.

Finally, one of the doctors Spent The experiment on himself: for 50 years, he crunched joints every day on one hand and never did this with the other hand. At the end of the experiment, the joints on his hands did not differ each other, and arthrosis did not develop.

Simply put, although the mechanism of the crunch of knuckles has not yet been fully studied, there is no evidence that it can lead to arthrosis, in science, so far.