Knee Pain Therapy Singapore – How To Avoid Knee Pain Surgery?

Knee pain is one of the most common complaint as we aged, we will experience some amount of knee joint pain and to some even have swelling symptoms from over prolonged walking and standing.

Knee joint started to wear and tear over the years and decrease the smooth surface of the cartilage, walking down the steps may become more challenging to many elderly, this is also known as  Osteoarthritis (OA).

“Use it or Lose it” is a common sign of sedentary individual who sit too long whether over the work station, physically inactive or couch potato,  somehow have higher risks of degenerative knee joint pain.

Excessive running or usage of lower limb in sports involving jumping, squatting, kicking or lunges are some of the knee pain conditions caused by sports.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT KNEE PAIN:

• Common knee pain can simply related to degeneration of knee joint and decreased in muscle mass
• Over weight increases the body weight bearing and stressing the knee joint while standing or walking is one of the underlying cause of knee pain symptom among the obese.
• Excessive of running typically the marathon runners have higher risks of experiencing runner’s knee pain (Patellofemoral pain syndrome) among the young athletics.
• Soccer players, tennis game, running and basketball have increased risk of knee joint pain conditions due to the high impact, intensity and velocity of the sports. Knee ligament sprained, ACL tear, meniscus tear, articular cartilage damages, dislocation and avulsion of ligaments and tendons are relatively common.

KNEE ANATOMY:

The knee is one of the most important part of our skeletal joint, our functional movement like walking, kneeling, squatting and lifting involved tremendous amount of great deal of stress from daily activities.

The knee is formed by the following parts of bone:

• This is the shin bone
• This is the thighbone or pillar of our body bone.
• Patella. The kneecap which protect both the tibia and femur from damage

Basically the knee joints of both the bone end are cushion by meniscus and protected by a covered layer of cartilage that absorbs shock with a smooth surface to protect the knee from gliding movements. Both the knees are connected by strong quadriceps muscles, ligaments, and tendons.

• There are 2 major muscles attached to the knee, the quadriceps muscles (located in front of the thighs), which facilitate the legs extension, and the back muscle hamstring (located behind the thighs), which flex the leg at the knee.
• While the muscle tendons are tough and strong tissue that connect the major muscles to the bones. Knee comprises of 4 Ligaments(ACL,PCL, LCL and MCL) are elastic tissue that stabilize and keeping the knee balance from dislocation.

Some common knee problems

Knee pain basically can be simply result of degeneration of the bone joint, wearing and tearing of cartilage as we age.

• Sprained or strained knee ligaments and muscles. Most sprained or strained knee ligaments or muscle can simply because of overloading in our daily activities, even though physical activities like walking, jogging or other exercises are highly beneficial to our well-being but it can leads to unnecessary stress on the knee ligaments.  Symptoms often include pain, swelling, and difficulty in walking.
• Torn cartilage. High impact of activities or sports can traumatize the knee that can cause tear to the meniscus (soft connective tissue that act as shock absorbers) and cartilage damages.  Such traumatized knee conditions can leads to joint effusion and severe inflammation.  Severe tears of meniscus n cartilage damage, a knee arthroscopy surgery usually is require to repair the tear.
• Tendonitis. Is the Inflammation of the tendons typically is the result from overuse of the patella tendon, especially high impact activities like running, jumping, or cycling. Patellar tendonitis is also known as jumper’s knee. It is common in sports, such as basketball, where the impact from jumping hitting the ground can damage and strains the tendon.
• Arthritis. Osteoarthritis(OA) is a common degenerative wear and tear of knee joint cartilage which lead to arthritis.  It is often affects elderly age from 50 years and older. OA can be also due to very sedentary lifestyle especially the desk bound work force. Other symptoms of OA is due to excessive of bodily wear bearing.  History of knee pain conditions or accident can lead to early symptoms of Rheumatoid arthritis.

How are knee diagnosed?

If you are suffering from knee pain over a prolong period, it is highly recommended to have a clinical diagnosis like:

• X-ray. It is a common imaging done on knee to diagnose the knee bone structure and finding of OA or narrowing of the 2 joint.
• Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). This test usually is common for any possibility of ligaments and meniscus tears.
• Computed tomography scan (also called a CT or CAT scan). CT scan test shows detailed images of all the body, the bones, muscles, fat, and organs. CT scans are more detailed than general X-rays.

THERAPY and INTERVENTION for KNEE PAIN

LIFESTYLE MODIFICATION

If the knee pain is simply due to body weight bearing, start to balance your diet and do exercise low to moderate intensity exercise like 150 to 180 mins of walking in a week. To avoid any stress and strain on the knee simply do sit and stand exercise to strengthen the thigh muscle. Gradually increase the exercises intensity to 10mins walk and 5mins light jog for 200-300mins over a week.

Moderate lower limb exercise is highly recommended and ensure adequate warming up of the knee joint before the start of the exercise.

Avoid prolong sitting especially desk bound related work, take a walk or sit and stand exercise on the work station every interval of 20-30 sitting.:

SHOCK WAVE THERAPY INTERVENTION

One of the most advance clinical, non-invasive intervention to help the patient to reduce knee joint inflammation and pain. Improves muscle imbalance and circulation to the joint. It also loosens scarred tissue from chronic muscular pain conditions.

ALTER G ANTI-GRAVITY MACHINE

A state of the art technology that help most of our patients to rehabilitate, strengthen muscles and lose weight in a short time frame. It can reduce body weight up to 90 percent during walking or running inside the machine to avoid any knee stress, strain or pain. It increases heart rates for more calories burn and lose body weight effectively, safe and fast. It corrects the gait movement/pattern while walking and running.

SURGERY CAN BE AVOIDED

Knee arthroplasty or total knee replacement (TKA) is the last option for any knee osteoarthritis. We helped many of our patients recovered from OA and other knee pain conditions. 

TKA is both invasive and expensive there are many risks and adversities.  One of the common adversity is leg length discrepancy that may hurt other parts of our body joints.  Other risks are nerve and artery damage, heart attack, stroke, blood clots etc.

Patients who are elderly and have heart conditions should consult the cardiologist for further evaluation for the procedures. 

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