What kind of recovery time did it take you to finally cure yourself of it, or did it ever cure?
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I’ve been suffering with it for 4 months now, and it gets better at times, but it has still kept me off of my bike for the most part. Ive taken five week breaks of just swimming, but it never managed to heal itself. I’ve ran out of options for self treatment, so Ive set up an appointment with a orthopaedist to see whether I would be a canidate for a knee arthoscopy.
Do NOT go to (most) orthopedists!
1st, isolate and strengthen you vastus medialis. Then, try a cho pat strap or something similar.
Good luck!
Strengthening your quadriceps might help pull the patella off of the femur and tib/fib, but I don’t see how it would help cleanse your knee of all that extra cartilage that has built up in your joint.
Do NOT strengthen your quads…that is the problem. Isolate and strengthen the vastus medialis.
“Extra cartilage” - pray-tell…how does is build up? Surgery is always the very last resort!
I’m doing PT as we speak to correct it, after having problems for 5+ months. Found out I have a weak gluteus muscle, allows my knee to “collapse” inward, patella get’s off track in laymans terms.
Test was I layed on my side, lifted leg up he pushed down, I should have been able to stop it and couldnt. Now I do 3 different exercises 3-4x week. I can try to describe them if your interested.
What kind of recovery time did it take you to finally cure yourself of it, or did it ever cure?
’
I’ve been suffering with it for 4 months now, and it gets better at times, but it has still kept me off of my bike for the most part. Ive taken five week breaks of just swimming, but it never managed to heal itself. I’ve ran out of options for self treatment, so Ive set up an appointment with a orthopaedist to see whether I would be a canidate for a knee arthoscopy.
Do NOT go to (most) orthopedists!
1st, isolate and strengthen you vastus medialis. Then, try a cho pat strap or something similar.
Good luck!
+1
DO NOT just listen to the orthopedists… they only think that surgery have solve your issue… start with a conservative treatment and don’t let them mess with your cartilage, before you have tried every other solution.
Condromalacia patella is a VERY weak diagnosis, which is being used if you have pain around the kneecap… I had the same diagnosis and suddently had pain from my knees… give it some time off… afterwards start doing weight training, to strenghten your Vastus medialis, mentioned above… also make sure that your vastus medialis and lateralis is equal in strength… Usualy, bikers tend to get an unbalanced lat vs med strength, which makes the patella track incorrectly…
sometimes its also just about doing strength work, to learn to activate both Vastus. lat. and med. in sync…
read up, before you let your knee operated… when it has, there is no going back… do the conservative solutions first… if they dont work, return and let them examine it further.
Vastus medialis is part of the quadriceps muscle group.
The cartilage I refer to is what some physicians might call “crab meat” in your joint space. Once it builds up it begins to rub together and cause the inflammatory response. This is what usually heard when you have crepitus in your knees. The reason I asked my question was because it seems like it would take a long time for this cartilage to start regressing after the months it took build up, and I’m not sure whether it does ever go away unless you have it removed
Strengthening the vastus medialis is spot on.
One way to do so (and can be done most any time) is straight leg raises. BUT… Do them with the foot HARD dorsiflexed, and the entire leg rotated outward from the hip (foot pointing up and outward). This concentrates the load on the VM. Hold for a 10 count, then relax. You can do this several times a day, and if you have a desk job, you can rehab at work and no one will be the wiser.
Anti-inflammatories can help you get through as well.
Glucosamine might not be a bad call either.
Do NOT strengthen your quads…that is the problem. Isolate and strengthen the vastus medialis.
“Extra cartilage” - pray-tell…how does is build up? Surgery is always the very last resort!
You mean the vastus medialis muscle that is part of your quads? I would love to see how you isolate this muscle in a Youtube video.
Vastus medialis is part of the quadriceps muscle group.
The cartilage I refer to is what some physicians might call “crab meat” in your joint space. Once it builds up it begins to rub together and cause the inflammatory response. This is what usually heard when you have crepitus in your knees. The reason I asked my question was because it seems like it would take a long time for this cartilage to start regressing after the months it took build up, and I’m not sure whether it does ever go away unless you have it removed
correct about Vastus medialis
correct on the cartilage.
The issue is that doing surgery for this “crab meat”, usualy dosnt solve the issue alone… if the cartilage is interfering with the joint movement or/and is hindering your extension and flexion, then surgery is necessary… if not, then your have to address the cause to this happening… this is usualy the pattella tracking incorrectly, which usualy can happen because of an imbalances of the quadriceps muscle group, wrong footwear(etc. need pronation footwear), ankle issues or/and lacking of strength/instability in the hip (core training)
my advise is simply, to rest first, try the conservative methods, then go for surgery if it dosnt help… just try find the cause of it, instead of just doing surgery and think everything is fine…
" Vastus medialis is part of the quadriceps muscle group"
If you don’t want to listen, don’t do it - you’ll have the surgery and still complain about the problem. We’re trying to help you.
The VM can be hard to isolate…if you strengthen the whole quad you don’t help the problem. Brider above gives a perfect explanation. Another way to do it is to sit on the floor with legs straight out front, hard dorsiflex, turn foot out, roll a towel up and place it under the knee, and repeatedly squish it to the floor holding the contraction at the end…100 times a day - my pavlov dog response it to do it every time my office phone rings…been doing it 25 + years.
" I would love to see how you isolate this muscle in a Youtube video. "
see brider above, or the technique using the towel. If you really need a video let me know…I am a lawyer, not a PT or Dr, but I have conquered this problem stemming from a football injury 36 years ago.
I agree with the above posters to wait a while. Really, 4 months is not a lot of recovery time (even though it feels like a long time when you can’t train). I was diagnosed with Chondromalacia in 2008. I put off surgery by doing PT and running conservatively.
A year ago, I was in a bad bike crash, I broke off a large piece of articular cartilage, the result was a large loose body and a nice pothole in my knee. I had to have arthroscopic surgery to remove the loose body. While in there, the surgeon “cleaned up” my knee, the type of procedure you are talking about. A month after surgery I had Synvisc injections in my knee to help lubricate. I rehabbed and did PT. Now I can bike and swim all I want, I choose not to run very much due tot he hole in my cartilage (different from chondromalacia). I’m not convinced that the Synvisc injections helped. It’s been 7 months and I haven’t noticed any decline in my knee, the injections are to be repeated every 6-9 months, I think.
If you go to an Ortho, find one that specializes in sports medicine. Be wary of any Ortho that recommends surgery right off the bat. I’m not sure how old you are, but try to find a training lifestyle that will promote the long term health of your knees rather than jump into surgery.
Best of luck!
I will give the vastus medialis exercises a try. The explanation the poster made about the lateralis and medialiscompeting and causing a tracking imbalance makes sense. Especially if it is true that you truly do use most of your lateralis in cycling.
The problem I have found with a lot of these strengthening exercise (including yoga), is that I still have knee pain after them. That’s what makes it even more frustrating to me.
I have an appointment with an sports med orthopaedist in two weeks to further access my problem, I guess ill see what her advice is.
Thanks for all the advice so far, everyone.
Silly
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Had my knee scoped and the rough stuff shaved down nice and smooth. Then went to rehab to rebalance my leg muscles. The McConnell taping method on my knee helped a lot during the rehab period. I was back on the basketball court in 3 weeks at 75% capacity. 100% at week 5.
diagnosed in 1976. Scoped then and told to strengthen. Lived in pain for decades (like 35 years) until I discovered glucosamine and chondroitin. I am now for the most part, pain free as long as I keep up the vitamin G&C.
I have dealt with this too, and my problem was not the vm. My glute medius/ minimus were weak, which allowed my knee to collapse in and pull my knee cap out of place. I have been doing lateral stepping with theraband around my ankles and am pleased with how things are going. It may not be the vm as many have suggested.
I had that problem a long time ago. Pretty sure it was an issue with my Vastus Medialis causing my knee tracking problem. Only had the problem in my right knee though.
jaretj
Alot of treatment discussion but little root cause comments;
I expect your bike position is encoraging Poor Knee tracking and out of plane loading contributing to your condition.
The pain is usually on the opposite side of the body to the location of the physical challenge which is causing your body to protect one side and sacrifice the other ( in terms of position and alignment).
Suggest you have your cleat position. Informed, investigate the need for arch support in your cycling shoes, then look toward varia heel correction to support the fort and achieve an in plane ankle and hence knee tracking…
It is. It uncommon for a seat height challenge to cause a dropped and rotated hip which twists your posture and again supports out of plane knee and ankles…
Many other factors can contribute, so I suggest read evey article you can on Steve hogg’s bike fit site, and pay the subscription and get in touch with Steve. He’s in sydney Australia but super helpful.
I ha d same condition and worked For 6 months of pt without addressing root cause ( incorrect bike fit, lack of arch support and varia correction…) . Pointless getting pt without root cause as it came right back without it…
Good luck…