Medial Knee Pain Alignment issue? Photos included
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Here are some photos. I am trying everything to fix this but just walking is very painful. My quad strength should be good enough now, although I may be imbalance with a weaker medial quad but looking at the photo of course I would be. The problem is my right knee- left side as you face the front facing photo. I feel rotated and out of place with my femur. Any thoughts on this and rehab or stretches that work? MRI in April was unremarkable. This came from overuse from laying floor tile : (
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Butthillrob steve60953
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steve60953 Butthillrob
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Butthillrob steve60953
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steve60953 Butthillrob
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Yesterday my ortho said the patella was tracking good. I was laying back when he ran that test. I did not demonstrate the image I posted because he said strengthen the medial quad. I had a "good" workout today before this photo, so I am geting upset that all this work has been useless trying to fix the main issue. At least the pain is not "as bad" with the increase in strength but forget running since walking needs to be the first step.
Butthillrob steve60953
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robert
Butthillrob
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steve60953 Butthillrob
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Probably. I can assure you the problem is altimately with the right knee. In isolation, or whatever, it is all right side related. Anything going on with the left is a result of compensations from the right side. Although one strange thing is when the right side feels better, the left kneecap starts to cause trouble.
Anyway, my legs are the same size, never a problem before with anything until overuse injury. In other words, it can be corrected as it is not bone related. I will say last summer when I tried to run it felt like I was stepping into little potholes with the right leg- it is not so bad now but I do not run anyway- that wold be insane right now. I only noticed the pronation after I took the photo. The injury came from getting up and down for 8 hours two hours two days in a row after being on my knees- I used my right/dominant knee to stand up each time. Muscles got tight, knee cracked (painlessly) as a result a couple time, and had pain since- also got pain at bottom of knee resetting some uneven tile- it is hard to pry them up after being set down.
12 days later my knee started cracking while walking. I suspect muscles shut down from pain and it was more downhill from there. I feel I got all my muscles back to where they need to be but my inner quad does not fire properly in relation to my other muscles. The inner hamstring and outter quad fire first upon contraction. The hamstring really shouldn't fire at all like it is, but as long as the inner quad/vmo does not, it will and cause tightness/pain and alignment issues. When I feel the vmo fire while walking, the knee pain goes away.
steve60953 Butthillrob
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I am trying to find the cause, not treat a symptom which is hard online, and hard apparently for 7 professionals that I saw. It would be like giving a lung cancer patient a cough drop because he is coughing too much- find out why. Two of the orthos strongly suggested quad strengthening, esp inner/vmo. That is the theory I have to go on as symptoms seem to help with this.
My hope is that when the vmo fires, it will Relax the outer quad and hamstrings since they are acting like knee stabilizers- real crappy job they do however. When they do they are overworked and tighten, pulling everything out of wack. I can feel this tightness in isolation compared to the left side. When they relax I can feel my glutes work too- I've only worked my glutes hard for 12 months so that theory is crap too- strengthen the glutes and all will be good. They to start teaching physios about the quads again- everything needs to be looked at but 99% of them do not know squat about rehab when it comes to compensations from injury/muscle wasting. I had two of them tell me my quads were fine, even when I know for fact my vmo was all but dead!
Butthillrob steve60953
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robert
steve60953 Butthillrob
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Butthillrob steve60953
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steve60953 Butthillrob
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peter73207 steve60953
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The one thing I have noticed during this op is the variety of sorted views among the health care professionals regarding recovery from this surgery.
At any rate, a couple of the exercises you mention I am already doing but I figure I just have to be a bit more aggressive so the stretch holds. I don't know how you do the one where your lying in the prone position with your leg over the bed and hold it for an hour.
OFG also recommended that one to me but Ive been holding it only for about 5 min and find that hard. Guess I just have to roll up my sleeves and bite on a stick! Haha
anyway, I will give those exercises some serious effort and let you know the results.
Thanks again for the tips.
steve60953 peter73207
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My thoughts on physio are that I had 3 of them and all failed me- made me worse off! I also know 4 other people that failed physio in the last year with no success stories so physios are clueless imo.
The leg entension machine is the only machine I could get to hit my quads. Now mind you I believe I have rotational issues and no exercise including walking was hitting the inner quad. The leg extension did, athough painful to start. Some days I had to quit because I could not get the knee loose. 10 lbs. was hard!
Today I made it to 160 lbs. with both legs- pretty much even pressure on both.
For you, start with short arcs near extension. Use your other leg to raise the bar to get you started. Turn your leg out a little if you need to hit the medial quad to start. Check your patella tracking and make sure it is not too painful or grinding too much. Go slow to start. I am sure these are not fr everyone but I can say the last two times I did these I felt much better but it takes time and strength. It will hurt to start if there is no muscle to support you- oh, place the bar a little higher than your ankle if you can adjust to take a little pressure off the knee. Good luck.
gpgp steve60953
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steve60953 gpgp
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