Knee pain is never simply knee pain it is always a lot more than this. We’ll have a look at 3 knee pain solutions that don’t really work long term.
Why?
Because the knee is affected by what happens at the ankle and the hip. Ankle injuries in particular often cause knee pain in the long term when they aren’t rehabbed fully. Having a full range of movement in the ankle ensures that you are much more likely to distribute the forces through the leg properly rather than overloading one aspect of leg. The most common thing that happens as=fter the likes of an ankle injury is that you overload the quads.
This extra load on the quads is fine in the initial stages as it helps offload some of the stress in the injured ankle but it isn’t a great long term solution. If you don’t start to spread the load more evenly again the quads will become irritated and you can experience pain around the knee cap, either above or below and sometimes over the surface of it.
This is just one example of what can happen that starts somewhere other than your knee but ends up causing knee pain.
3 Knee Pain Solutions that don’t work
1- Always wearing knee supports
Lots and lots of people wear knee supports be they simple elasticated bandages to more complex and sophisticated looking ones. These can be useful in the very short term in that they help keep the area warm and also make you stop worrying about your knee. Long term they provide no benefit in terms of actually helping your knee pain. They don’t in any way resolve the underlying issue which is most likely somewhere else.
2 – Pain Killers
Absolutely fantastic short term. Painkillers help let you move around when you might otherwise be avoiding movement but a real hindrance long term. In the long term if you are continuing to have to take them to do things it’s a good sign that things are more than just a “sore knee”. This does not mean anything serious is wrong but simply the issue isn’t resolved.
3 – Avoiding activity and complete rest
Complete rest of the knee is almost impossible but even avoiding activities isn’t a great idea.
During the initial stages avoiding some activities is a good idea and is something I suggest. In the long term though it really doesn’t help. To begin with you want to reduce the level of any activity to the point where any irritation is minimised. After this period you want to start getting back into these activities as fast as is reasonable.
Our tissues need load, read to be used, in order for them to fully heal so avoiding stressful activities beyond the initial stages isn’t a good idea.
Runners are a good example of this. Where possible I want any runner I treat back running as soon as it is safe to do so. This doesn’t mean that they will be completely pain free. At this point, they will have reached a stage where they can run in complete safety so long as they follow the guidelines I give them. They will have been hopping, skipping and jumping but still need to adjust to the specific demands of running.
If you’ve been suffering from knee pain you can get a copy of our KNEE PAIN eBook by clicking on the image.
