Knee Injuries

If you’ve sprained your knee, then you’ve stretched or torn one of its ligaments. The most serious sprains involve complete tears of one or more of the knee ligaments.

Strains, on the other hand, occur when you’ve partially or completely torn a muscle or tendon. With knee strains, you may feel symptoms similar to a sprain and may see bruises around the injured area.

With tendinitis, or inflammation (irritation) of the tendon, a teen may have pain or tenderness when walking, trying to lift a leg, or when bending or extending a leg. That’s because the tendon (especially the tendon that connects the kneecap to the thighbone) has stretched or become inflamed from overuse during sports.

Meniscal injuries are fairly common, especially in sports such as football and basketball where sudden changes in speed or side-to-side movements can cause the meniscus to tear. If you have a meniscal injury, you might have felt your knee pop when you injured it and you may now feel quite a bit of pain.

A fracture is a cracked, broken, or shattered bone. If you broke your tibia, femur, or patella, you might have heard or felt a bone snap. You may have trouble moving that bone and it’s likely there’s a lot of pain.

Patellar dislocation is when the patella – the kneecap – is knocked off to the side of the knee joint. Sometimes it will go back to its normal position by itself, but usually it will need to be put back into place by a doctor. If your kneecap has been dislocated, you will probably have swelling and feel a lot of pain at the front of your knee.

Osteochondritis dessicans (OCD) occurs when a small piece of bone or cartilage softens or breaks off from the end of a bone, causing long-term knee pain. Symptoms of OCD include pain, swelling, an inability to extend the leg, and stiffness, catching, or popping sensations with knee movement.

If you’re a runner or cyclist, you may be at risk for chondromalacia. This condition occurs when the articular cartilage in the knee joint softens because of injury, muscle weakness, or overuse, and the patella and the thighbone may rub together. This causes pain and aching, especially when a person walks up stairs or hills. Treatment may involve surgery.

Degenerative Osteoarthritis (DOA) of the knee.  This is a degenerative condition of the knee joint that requires special treatment.  When not treated the patient experiences chronic pain to the knee.  Occasionally, knee replacement surgery has to be indicated.