Literature Review

Osteoarthritis is a chronic joint disorder commonly affecting the knee and hip and may produce pain, stiffness, and loss of function.

Clinical trials evaluating therapies for symptomatic osteoarthritis commonly measure both pain and physical function because improvement in symptoms alone does not fully characterize treatment benefit.

The WOMAC Index is a disease-specific patient-reported outcome instrument developed for assessment of health status and outcomes in osteoarthritis of the knee and hip. WOMAC includes assessment domains addressing:

• Pain
• Stiffness
• Physical function

Patient-reported outcome instruments provide direct information regarding the participant's experience of symptoms and functional limitations.

Conversational administration may provide an additional opportunity to evaluate whether participants understand questions and response options as intended.

Voice-derived sentiment and affective signals may provide contextual information indicating uncertainty, hesitation, frustration, confusion, or other interaction characteristics.

Within this study, such signals are not treated as substitutes for patient-reported outcomes. They are used as triggers within the clinical AI orchestration layer to determine when clarification or intervention may be appropriate.