If your knee pain from a torn meniscus has been worrying you because it hurts and swells every time you try to be on your feet for a while, you are not alone.

That is the common story we hear from people suffering with a meniscus tear and trying to treat it without surgery. It’s even the story we hear from people that have already had meniscus surgery and STILL have problems afterward.

But there is hope for your meniscus! Even if you’ve had meniscus surgery!

You don’t need to rely on pain medications or injections. You don’t need to stretch better, ride the bike for longer, or walk through the knee pain. And nearly always, it’s possible to avoid meniscus surgery.

Knee pain from a meniscus tear happens because of muscle imbalances that put too much pressure through the knee joint and over-compress the meniscus. Sometimes there’s a traumatic injury like a fall, car accident, or sports injury that sends the meniscus over the edge, but the muscle imbalance is typically already there making the knee vulnerable.

But doctors will tell you that the meniscus tear happened because of your age and all the old injuries you’ve had from your younger years. They’ll find something about you to blame it on that’s typically completely out of your control right now. They’ll say things like “we’ll you’re no spring chicken anymore,” and “all those years of running and sports have caught up with you,” and my favorite, “you need to lose a few pounds to take pressure off your meniscus.”

There’s absolutely nothing you can do about your age, exercise is supposed to be good for you so now they’re making you feel bad for exercising yourself into a meniscus tear, and unless you’re more than 70-100 pounds overweight, your meniscus should be able to take it. Losing a few pounds isn’t going to move the needle on healing your meniscus for the long term.

A torn meniscus must be addressed at the root of the problem. Pain medications, injections, weight loss, rest and surgery DO NOT solve the root problem. Muscle imbalances need to be corrected! Very often quadricep and hamstring muscles are too strong in the thigh. This causes lots of extra pressure to go through the knee joint. The extra pressure that’s constantly there, even at rest, even while sleeping is what wears on your meniscus over time. THAT’S the root problem.

And doctors are not trained on this in medical school. Even physical therapists don’t get this in their schooling. I would know having been through physical therapy school and taught as an orthopedics professor. Most physical therapists’ training is focused on helping people right after having surgery.

Healing a meniscus tear naturally, for the long-term requires the help of a specialist clinic like ours.

Once you’ve had an MRI and been diagnosed with a meniscus tear by your doctor, they’ll tell you to rest it, and take pain medications with anti-inflammatories to help with the swelling. They may recommend ice and elevation too.

This is okay to do for a really flared up meniscus injury, but typically doesn’t need to be kept up more than a few days after the knee flares down.

They may send you to physical therapy to exercise and stretch. Physical therapists are infamous for flaring up meniscus injuries because they usually treat them like someone who’s just had a knee surgery and make them exercise EVERY muscle in the area. 

There’s no regard to muscle imbalances and the fact that they might be feeding into the problem. And I don’t blame them because they’re doing the best they can with what they know. They just don’t have the specialist knowledge to properly handle healing a torn meniscus.

If the knee pain and swelling continues from the meniscus tear, then you might be referred to a surgeon who can do a meniscus repair or meniscectomy (meniscus removal). They often will recommend surgery, especially if you’ve “tried everything” (they won’t know about fixing the root problem like we do here). A surgeon will describe the surgery to you as easy and quick since they only need to make very small incisions using fancy state-of-the-art tools and techniques.

WATCH OUT! There’s research just out in recent years showing that these 2 surgeries, especially the meniscectomy, leaves the patient with a higher risk of developing knee osteoarthritis at a faster pace than usual. 

This makes sense since the meniscus is essentially a cushion for the knee joint. Less cushion would mean the bones rub on each other more, so why is this surgery still offered?

To make matters worse, people who have meniscus surgery sometimes end up having another meniscus tear that the surgeon will then repair for a second time and take out even more meniscus tissue!

At my clinic, our patients go through treatment that is 100% focused on treating the root muscle imbalances that cause the meniscus to tear. We help take pressure off the knee joint so that patients have a chance to finally heal their meniscus and feel normal again. We even do this for people that already had meniscus surgery and they have great results too!

At our El Paso clinic, we understand how difficult life with knee pain can be - because we’ve been helping people with chronic knee osteoarthritis pain, like you, for nearly 10 years.
If you want natural, medication-free relief from knee pain, so that you can enjoy an active, mobile and pain-free life, you will love what we can do for you!

Set up a free Discovery Visit today to find out how we can help you - our knee pain specialists would be happy to discuss your individual needs and create a personalized plan of action for fast knee pain relief without relying on pain medication, injections, or having a potentially unnecessary surgery.

Our natural and pain medication-free approach to treating knee pain means that you can get back to doing the things you love - without having to worry about your knee pain getting worse.

EL PASO MANUAL PHYSICAL THERAPY
2601 E. Yandell Drive, Suite 232
El Paso, Texas 79903

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