[swe_dima]

Just like in programming, the boring but true answer is "it depends", because every situation is different.

A generic advice that I learned is that muscle-strengthening exercises help A LOT. Basically muscles form a protective corset around your knee and reduce the stress on your joints by a lot.

Also, arthritis often happens due to low blood flow, so as painful as it may be, you have to keep moving, try not to sit too much.

Another generic piece of advice is controlling your weight, this is just simple math, the less you weigh, the less stress your knee receives.

What also worked for me was hyaluronic acid injections, when I was in a lot of pain and it was hard to work on my muscles, hyaluronic acid helped to reduce this pain by being a good lubricant. Probably I am going overboard with it now, but I keep having injections every 3 months just to be safe. It can be of different concentration and volume. If you inject something with a smaller % you have to do it multiple times in a row with 5-7 days between, if you inject something with a higher % then a single injection is okay.

The PRP / SVF part you already read about. I am also a 31 yo, so while I am young my body is better at regeneration, I don't think elderly people get the same effect from these. I did 3 sessions x 5 PRP injections with 6 months between sessions. The effect is by no means immediate.

It's certainly a hard road, but better than a wheelchair.

[saiya-jin]

Yes building supporting/stabilizing muscles can do wonders, but as with everything key is to start way before you actually have problems and pain - that's a phase when body is already struggling and failing to fix things long term and degradation happens. Look at your direct ancestors for clues.

Adequate stress on joints from right exercises executed in good form are part of this. Beginners almost never got this right and overdo things, investing into professional help in the beginning is very good idea.

Same with weight - when people react to degrading health due to say being obese, one is beyond point of return in many things comprising overall quality of life and health. Like getting your act together after first heart attack, way too late.

If in pain, generally don't exercise through it, body is saying something ain't right so rather address it. Try things like swimming which put very little stress on the knees yet can work whole body efficiently. You really want to have all parts of body developed well, otherwise you will be always chasing some degradation like whack-a-mole without ever winning.