Osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis is one types of arthritis commonly heard amongst aged population, especially female over age of 55 years old. Osteoarthritis is abbreviated as OA or referred to as degenerative arthritis or degenerative joint disease (DJD). Among the over 100 different types of arthritis conditions, osteoarthritis is the most common happen condition.

Cartilage is a connector between the bones and the joints that serves as a "cushion". Arthritis always caused by tear down and eventual loss of the cartilage of joints. Osteoarthritis commonly affects the hands, feet, spine, and large weight-bearing joints, such as the hips and knees.

Primary osteoarthritis is mostly a result of natural aging of the joint. When we are getting older, the fluid compound of the cartilage will increases, and the protein substance makeup of cartilage will degenerates. Gradually, cartilage begins to degenerate by flaking. In advanced osteoarthritis, cartilage cushion between the bones and the joints will totally loss. Joint pain will gradually appear and become obvious over repetitive use of the worn joints for our daily activities.



Signs and symptoms of osteoarthritis vary from patient to patient. Osteoarthritis of the knees always linked to obesity or excess upper body weight, or has history of injury or joint surgery. Bowlegged is a osteoarthritis condition cause by progressive cartilage degeneration of the knee joints that lead to deformity and outward curvature of the knees.

People with osteoarthritis of the weight-bearing joints such as the knees can develop a limp. The limping condition can go worsen over the time as more cartilage degenerates. Medicine and some common treatments may not curable for some patients regarding to the joint pain and limping. Severe osteoarthritis of the knees is one of the most common reasons for knee replacement surgical.

There is no way to use blood test for the diagnosis of osteoarthritis. However blood test can be performed to exclude diseases that can cause secondary osteoarthritis, as well as to exclude other arthritis conditions that look similar to osteoarthritis.

X-rays of the affected joints can be used to diagnose osteoarthritis. The common X-ray findings of osteoarthritis include loss of joint cartilage, narrowing of the joint space between adjacent bones, and bone spur formation.

Weight reduction cause by obesity that put on excessive weight on joint is important for the treatment. Intense activities that put excessive stress on the joint cartilage should avoid. There are no specific treatments to halt cartilage degeneration or to repair damaged cartilage in osteoarthritis. The goal of treatment in osteoarthritis is to reduce joint pain and inflammation while improving and maintaining joint function. Physical therapy and mechanical support devices such as knee braces can relief the condition.

Pain Inside Knee Joint PCL Injury

Pain inside knee joint, a posterior cruciate ligament injury is causing by tearing or stretching of the posterior cruciate ligament PCL.

Physical examination by doctor needed when there are signs of PCL injury. Doctor will ask you to move your knee joint in different ways. Fluid in the knee joint may also check to see if there is bleeding inside knee joint. For more serious case, knee joint MRI and knee joint x-ray may be required.

The posterior cruciate ligament PCL is the strongest ligament in the knee. It extends from the top-rear surface of the tibia to the bottom-front surface of the femur. The ligament controls the stability of posterior knee joint, avoiding tibia from moving over behind the femur.

Posterior cruciate ligament injury usually happen by over stretching the knee joint (hyperextension). This can easily happen if you land improperly or too hard from jumping. The PCL injury can also caused from a direct blow to the flexed knee, such as smashing your knee in a car accident (called "dashboard injury") or falling hard on a bent knee.

Posterior cruciate ligament injury symptoms are obvious to be seen. When you have below symptoms, you have chances of PCL injury.

• Knee joint pain 

• Knee joint instability 

• Back knee swelling 

In common practice, first aid treatments for PCL injury are

• Applying ice to the area 

• Elevating the knee joint above the level of the heart 

• Taking non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) for pain relief 

You should not have any intense physical activity until the knee swelling is shrinking down until disappear and the pain inside knee joint is gone. Proper physical therapy can help you to regain knee joint and leg muscle strength. If the PCL injury are more serious and cannot recover from above therapy, you may need surgery. This may be either knee arthroscopy or open surgical reconstruction.

For ages population, pain inside knee joint are more commonly happen. There are weak to their bone, ligaments and knee joint. Daily physical activities are advised not to be intense and be careful.

Runner Knee

What is Runners Knee

Runner knee is a common sport injury among runners. As like its name as runner knee, runner tends to have such sport injury of pain in knee cap. Pain after running happen to every runner, no matter how careful you are when running. This kind of accidental sport injury however can be reduces to minimal although it is no 100% to avoid runner knee.

Causes of Runner Knee

Runner knee also known as Patellafemoral Pain Syndrome (PFPS). Accidental trauma directly to the knee cap like blow or fall to knee cap is one of the causes to knee pain on the outside of the knee. Knee pain on the outside of the knee can be happen when we are running at a soft surface like beach area. Some runners have the preference to run at beach sand area to train their stamina and leg power. Misalignment arising from the runner knee will cause more stress afterward, as the runner bodyweight are unable distribute evenly to both knee joints and calf. It will further irritate the inside knee pain and causing more damage. Knee pain on the outside of the knee and misalignment is a serious sport injury and must not be ignored.

Inner knee pain can be happen in our daily activities like walking and climbing staircase. Overuse of our knee cap will lead to inside knee pain syndrome. It normally happens if we walk for more than 1 hour without interval rest. Our knee joints will get irritated and sore. Since inner knee pain is cause by overuse of our knee cap, it is easier to take prevention measure than any other causes of runner knee.

For the athletes like marathon runners and sprinter, runner knee that knee pain when running is most common sport injury to them. Marathon runner with less practice and not enough warm up easily felt sudden sharp pain at their knee cap and behind knee pain after nearing to 1 hour of running mileage. Strike by Knee pain from running, you can feel the clicking sound while you are running. This condition tells us that our cartilages used to support our knee joints are worn and irritated. The cartilages are shock absorber to our knee joints and play an important role in our mobility. Some athlete continue running with knee pain until reach the final, however this is very dangerous.

The correct and quality sport shoe also play important role in the causes of knee pain from running. Flat feet runner need to buy sport shoe with arch support. It must able to support your feet comfortably when you step down and step up. Weak thigh muscles and without enough muscles stretching before running also leads to knee pain when running

.

Runner Knee Symptoms and Diagnoses

Runner knee has several symptoms which are very obvious. Whenever you have pain behind knee after running or certain activities which takes long timing, most chances you are getting running knee pain. Pain in knee cap, pain when bending like squatting, running and sitting, swelling and bruising, and grinding or clicking sound in the knee joints whenever you move tell you that runner knee are stricken to you. Every symptom has its degree of seriousness. It is best for you to seek medical professional to check. X-ray, MRI, CT scan and radiology are common tests to identify the running knee pain.

Knee Pain Treatment – RICE Program

There are RICE program to alleviate and recuperate running knee pain. RICE refers to four steps: Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation.

1.       Rest : Try to rest as much as possible by avoid putting weight to knee joints to prevent further irritate the damage knee cap.

2.       Ice :  To reduce the pain and swelling, and circulate the blood. Apply ice pack to the sport injury area for 20 minutes 3 times per day.

3.       Compression : Use brace or straps to cover the knee cap to provide extra support and fix the knee joints alignment.

4.       Elevation : Elevate your knee on a pillow when you are lying or sitting.

These four steps should be able to cure running knee pain. It must be taken care well after recovery to protect it from reoccur. If these RICE program unable to alleviate and recuperate pain after running, please seek for medical professional.

Knee Pain Relief – Home Care Non Surgical Knee Pain Treatment

Knee Pain Relief – Home Care Non Surgical Knee Pain Treatment

Every people will start looking for knee pain relief after the pain of the knee affect them. When it comes to knee pain relief, there are many different types of treatment of knee pain depend on individuals based on the causes of pain behind knee. Some may use one knee pain treatment and recover within short period, while some may be take long term period and involve combinations of knee pain treatment like medication and physical therapy. We should get consultation from professional doctor before we start our treatment to avoid further damages in improper treatment of knee pain.

Medication

Many back knee pain medications that we can buy from pharmacy are used to decrease the pain and reduce or stop the inflammation. Common medications on shelf are anti-inflammatory medicine, corticosteroids and pain reliever. Medications may be useful if the pain of the knee is minor and not serious. Supplements and nutrition also plays an important role in curing and prevention of back knee pain.

Exercises

Exercises are always recommended by doctor and knee pain expert to improve and relief the pain of the knee. Such exercises are used to strengthen muscles, and improve endurance and flexibility of joints, cartilages and tendons. Such exercise must me in mild mode to avoid further behind knee injury. Long term of such exercises will decrease back knee pain and prevent such condition from recurring.

Injections

There are two types of injections to knee pain relief, which is Cortisone and Hyaluronan. Cortisone injected is synthetically produced that close to cortisone naturally produced by our body adrenal gland. Cortisone cures the back knee pain by stopping the inflammation. Hyaluronan is different than cortisone. Hyaluronan is knee joints fluid injected into the knee joints to lubricate and allows cartilages surfaces of joints to glide in smooth condition. Some people call it knee joints lubrication. This is most popular way to treat the back pain knee.

Weight Management

Our knee supports our overall body weight. Obesity leads to extra weight to our knee causing pain of the knee. Every pound that we are overweight puts extra 5 pounds of pressure to our knee joints when we climb the staircase. By weight management, it will help to reduce and ease the burden of the knee joints. Our body weight should be in good proportion with our height to maintain good health and body bones, cartilages, tendons, muscles and knee joints healthy to prevent pain of the knee.

Physical and Occupational Therapy

Occupational therapy teaches you how to reduce strain and pain of the knee during daily activities. Occupational therapist will provide advice on how to modify your home to prevent behind knee injury cause by improper home design and furniture. Physical therapist will design exercise program to improve the strength of muscles, endurance and flexibility of knee joints to reduce the pain of the knee.

Hot and Cold Therapy

Hot and cold therapy is used for two main purposes in back knee pain: reduction of inflammation and knee pain relief. In this method, ice will be applied first to the behind knee injury for 15 minutes. The ice pack will reduce the temperature of the knee; contract the blood vessel and reducing blood flow to knee. When ice pack removed from the knee, the blood vessel will heated back, dilate and blood rush in to the knee, and then flushes out inflammatory chemical. Ice also helps to numb your nerve impulse which reduces the back knee pain.

Assistive equipment

We can have knee pain relief by the help of equipments like crutches and knee brace. Crutches help us to share our body weight to ease the burden of our knee joints. Knee brace is strap firmly to your knee cap, fit our knee joints in align and share the weight equally to whole both leg. Knee brace reduce the pain of the knee especially when we climb up and down from staircase.

Avoidance

When we are having back knee pain, we must avoid from carrying heavy stuff. Heavy stuff will add extra stress to our knee joints causing more inflammatory and knee pain. We also need to avoid all kinds of excessive activities like running and excessive exercises. We will also need to avoid from long time of standing and walking. Try to take some rest after 20 minutes of stand or walk. It will help to reduce the pain of the knee.

Back Knee Pain

Back Knee Pain Most of the people will have back knee pain once in their life. One of the most common pain in back knee is Arthritis. Arthritis affects people regardless of regions, races, ethnics, and ages. In the American family, those with ages above 50 and obese are the largest groups having Arthritis. Every year huge amount of medical expenses are used in pain of the knee disease.

If we specify pain in back knee in details, there have more than 100 kinds of arthritis. In general, arthritis is a result of inflammation of one or more knee joints. In our body structure like leg, knee, wrist and hand, our bones are linked together by joints. Hence, our hand, knee, leg and wrist can be bend, grasp and squat. The knee joints always the causes of pain behind knee because of the complexity and joint of muscles, tendons, cartilages, and bones.

Symptoms and Causes of pain behind knee

Since back knee pain is happen to our knee joints, it will severely affect our daily life and mobility. Imagine that we have great pain in back knee when we move our leg, walk outside for activities like working and socialize. For the worse cases, we will feel pain even we are at rest and even sleep.

Back knee pain can be happening suddenly without any prior notice or behind knee injury. It can happen to anyone and at any time and regardless of poor or rich. The common symptoms for all arthritis are different degree of pain in back knee, swelling, joint stiffness. When using staircase, the patient will feel painful and move very slow. In the long run, the back knee pain will affect other organs in the body and causing weight loss, poor sleep, muscle aches and pains, malaise and a feeling of tiredness, tenderness, difficult to bend the knee joints and inability to use walk.

Diagnose and Treatment of Back Knee Pain

When we feel uncomfortable with our back knee pain, it is often the time we consult related professional doctor. Normally pain in back knee diagnoses will supported by radiology and blood tests.

There are few knee pain treatment options for back knee pain. For the minor pain of the knee, it can be cure naturally with more rest, avoiding the knee from bearing all your weight by standing or carrying heavy stuff. Your knee can also supported by wearing rubber knee bracer to maintain your whole body weight to your whole leg. Clutches is another equipment to ease pain the back of the knee. Physical therapy, medications, and lifestyle changes like exercises and weight control is another option of knee pain treatment.

Medications can reduce the inflammation in the knee joint and decrease the pain. Physical exercise of the affected knee joints can have good improvement to the pain of the knee in term of knee pain relief. Exercises always focus on strengthen the muscles, flexibility and endurance. If back knee pain continuous and in severe stage, knee replacement surgery will take in place.

After Back Knee Pain Care

The recurrences of back knee pain after recover is very common and always come back after year. Once we have pain the back of the knee, the post pain of the knee care is very important. We must prevent it from let the pain in back knee happen again in future. There are many programs in the market that offer long term exercises solution to improve our knee joints and muscle strength and endurance to protect our knee health. With the determination, all of us can overcome and prevent this common pain of the knee away from us and lead a quality life and reduce our medical expenses to minimal. We must aware and avoid behind knee injury from daily activities and sports.

Pain Behind Knee

Pain behind knee

Do you ever heard people surrounding you claim of pain behind knee? Does your home elderly or relatives having pain behind the knee? How does back knee pain affect patient life and quality of life? Pain behind knee is noticed by the feeling of soreness, stiffness, discomfort, burning feel or pain. The back knee pain happen in movement condition, but sometimes it may also happen even without movement like sleep. The pain in back of knee may severe enough to limit our mobility and even causing disability.

Pain behind knee has become most common orthopedic problem many people having today. Pain in back of knee is most obvious among obese individuals and individuals with age above 50. The knee joint consists of three compartments; these are medial, lateral, and patellofemoral. The knee cap joins the femur to form patellofemoral. The structure provides our leg with ability to bend and squat. As our body weight is carry by our leg when we are standing and moving, the knee joint provide immense function for the mobility. With the incorrect posture of bending and carrying heavy stuff, we tend to have behind knee injury.

Causes of pain behind knee

There are many causes that lead to pain behind knee. Pain behind the knee that arises suddenly to us is easier to cure than chronic back knee pain. Sudden pain behind knee always more painful and have obvious symptoms. Sport injury and overuse of knee joint and muscles are the main causes for sudden pain in back of knee. Athletes like sprinter and long distances runner have higher risk to behind knee injury. Cleaner and construction workers also expose to the risk of pain of the knee because they always have least time to rest, overuse the leg to stand, walk and work for whole days.

Baker’s cyst is known to be cause of pain behind knee. We normally call Baker’s cyst as popliteal synovial cyst. Synovial fluid is a medium in our popliteal to lubricate the knee joint and reduces friction between the knee joint cartilages. When there are tear in our cartilages, the synovial fluid will flush in to the torn area, causing the pain behind the knee. Swelling and redness is obvious symptoms in Baker’s cyst. Although symptoms of Baker’s cyst obvious, it will not cause long term damage to the knee joint.

Deep vein thrombosis is another cause of pain behind knee. However, deep vein thrombosis is dangerous and may lead to death. It is caused by the blood clot in the knee joint. The blood clot may break to small clot and carrying it to other part of body. It will lead to the risk of pulmonary embolism in the lungs and heart attack. The symptoms of deep vein thrombosis are very similar to Baker’s cyst: redness, swelling, bruising and pain behind knee.

Peripheral vascular disease is another cause of pain behind knee. People who are overweight tend to have this disease. Peripheral vascular disease is caused by narrowing vein at the knee joint. Blood is used to carry nutrition and oxygen to all part of body and communicate with our brain. People who always eat high cholesterols food will have fat deposits in the vein increasing the risk of pain of the knee.

Diagnosing Pain behind knee

We should not take minimal concern to pain behind knee. When the normal home care steps are taken and yet the symptoms not easing, we need to consult medical professional immediately. The crucial symptoms to aware are stiffness behind the knee, extensive swelling and bruising, limitation of mobility, behind knee injury and pain in the back of knee without movement. Medical professional may use equipments like X-rays, MRI, radiology and other related medical equipments to identify the causes of pain behind knee and provide the long term back knee pain treatment and medications.