What Is the Knee Meniscus?
For you to gain a better understanding of how to recover from a a knee meniscus injury, it's important that you get to grips with what the meniscus actually is and how it influences the function and structure of the knee joint.
The meniscus is a piece of cartilage found within your knee joint. Its main purpose is to stabilize the joint and cushion its component parts from the damage caused by physical impact. Ultimately, it acts to minimize the process of wear and tear of the joint.
Unfortunately, a knee meniscus injury can occur even in the simplest of circumstances. If you twist your knee while playing sport, you run the risk of your meniscus tearing. If this happens, a piece of the meniscus tissue can easily become lodged in the knee joint, the biological equivalent of putting a spanner in the works.
As twisting is the most common way of sustaining a knee meniscus injury, it occurs mostly during games of soccer, basketball or football. It is often accompanied by damage to the anterior cruciate ligament.
What Are the Symptoms?
If you have injured your meniscus, you can expect to feel a number of symptoms. Of course, the most immediately obvious symptom is knee pain, and this may occur alongside swelling and difficulty in bending and straightening the leg.
Much as with injuries to the anterior cruciate ligament, you're likely to feel a popping sensation as you tear a meniscus. One of the most specific symptoms is that of a locking sensation in the knee as a piece of the meniscus gets stuck in the joint.
What Is the Best Treatment for a Knee Meniscus Injury?
The treatment required to heal meniscal tears really depends on the severity of the tear as well as its exact location. Your doctor will ascertain the specifics by means of imaging tests.
If the tear is small and within the so-called red zone that is well supplied with blood, then you can expect the tear to heal on its own as long as you rest up properly. If the injury is larger and has occurred in the white zone, which is poorly supplied with blood, then you may have to adopt a more proactive treatment plan.
If you're fortunate enough to have a mild injury, you can follow the RICE procedure common to all such physical complaints and then perhaps wear a knee brace as you ease yourself back into higher levels of activity. You may also want to take anti-inflammatory medications under your doctor's supervision.
More severe knee meniscus injuries involving locking of the knee require surgery to reshape and relocate the meniscus as appropriate. This kind of surgery is rather simple and low risk, but you still have to take your doctor's prescribed aftercare regime very seriously if you want to regain full function of your knee.
You may need to spend some time with a physiotherapist and you'll probably have to wear a knee brace for some time as your body recovers and gets used to increasingly greater activity levels. Not all such support devices are made equally though, and it's very important that you find the right knee brace for your exact requirements.
Your physiotherapist will be able to help you find a suitable knee brace that has been designed by experts with meniscus tears in mind. Make sure you opt for a knee brace made employing the latest developments in medical and material sciences.
Check out all the knee braces made for treating meniscus tears and choose the right one for your needs. You'll be back on your feet in no time at all.
