Many have heard elderly family members claim that a change in the weather is coming because their joints are aching. But does joint pain genuinely have predictive power over the weather?

Millions of older people, including those with rheumatoid arthritis, were part of a comprehensive study exploring the age-old belief that joint pain can predict weather changes such as rain or snow.

A group of US-based experts has revealed their findings in the BMJ ultimately concluding that rain doesn’t have an impact on joint pain based on their nubers, although they are still open to the possibility.

While the researchers acknowledge slight differences for joint pain reported on rainy days, they noted: “(The differences) were so small that they are unlikely to be clinically meaningful.”

Still, the scientists aren’t completely dismissing the idea of grandad’s knees being natural barometers: “No relation was found between rainfall and outpatient visits for joint or back pain. A relation may still exist, and therefore larger, more detailed data on disease severity and pain would be useful to support the validity of this commonly held belief.”

To investigate the potential link between joint pain and the weather, the team examined medical claims from the US Medicare system, involving more than 1.5 million adults over the age of 65.

They analysed doctor visitations for joint or back pain over four years, from 2008 to 2012, which totalled around 11.6 million appointments.

Scientists have been analysing rainfall data from US weather stations to discern patterns in how rain influences the number of individuals seeking medical advice for certain conditions and symptoms.

The study focused on patients with osteoarthritis, spondylosis, intervertebral disc disorders, and other non-traumatic joint disorders.

They discovered that with ongoing rainfall, a 1mm increase in precipitation was associated with a 0.318% rise in outpatient visits for joint pain.

On days when individuals attended their doctor’s appointments, there was a 0.04% uptick in outpatient visits for joint pain when it wasn’t raining.

The researchers acknowledged some limitations in their study, particularly the lack of detailed information regarding the severity of the pain.

This suggests that fewer people might seek medical attention on rainy days, yet their pain could be more intense, indicating a potential link between weather conditions and the severity of pain.

Furthermore, they noted: “We lacked information on use of drugs during periods of pain exacerbation; patients could self manage symptoms by taking over-the-counter analgesics, which would not be detectable in our data.”