Dislocated my knee & subsequent problems…..

[Snitch]

Any shared experience/advice welcome!
I dislocated my knee last October when I was out running on some very muddy ground under a tree. I was simply squatting down to rest for a second and as I went stand up, my kneecap dislocated (oh my, it hurt!). Paramedics put the knee back in place, with immediate relief, bar my entire leg soon being swollen to twice its size (no exaggeration).
But looking back before the dislocation, both my knees were giving me warnings of not being quite right; they felt like they were threatening to ‘lock’ and give way (but didn’t). I was experiencing some pain from time to time usually after exercise (even walking). In the past few months I have been having increasing problems with both knees intermittently, but when they do start, I certainly feel as though there’s a big problem. Not every occasion, but increasingly when I walk a lot, particularly on soft ground my knees become inflamed and feel like they’re on fire and I feel pain and a burning sensation in the middle of both knees. Sometimes the pain will run down my calf too. After rest the pain eases – until the next time. I only dislocated my right knee but both knees are causing pain and it is becoming more frequent.
Anyone else have, or had, similar problems? I have a blackbelt in karate and I do teach it, which can put wear and tear on joints, though karate has been increasingly difficult to participate in since my dislocation. Feel a visit to a GP is going to have to be made soon as it’s a bit of a worry, particularly the thought that it may be arthritis, at the age of 45!
Please drop me a line if you’re having or have had the same or similar problems. If you have a diagnosis of arthritis, do your symptoms match mine?
Thanks in anticipation!

[Redders]

I have ehlers-danlos hypermobility syndrome, so dislocate fairly frequently. I had a really bad knee dislocation in October last year, had MRI and knee in a brace for a bit and was told by the consultant that no amount of physio would fix me, so I have just undergone a reconstruction, tendon graft and chondroplasty to fix it. I had pain from the injury, but I always have joint pain so was harder to distinguish which was caused by what.
I would perhaps request a referral to an orthopedic surgeon who can assess you and see what the deal is.

[Snitch]

Yours sounds bad! Hope you’re doing ok now. Yes, I’ll make a GP appointment to ask for tests.

[Kelly]

Me too, how bizarre – I’ve never known anyone else with it before.
Yes, burning sensation and a tight tension pain affect my knees badly from time to time, but it doesn’t concern me too much as I know what it is and that I just have to take it easy for a bit. Dislocations started to hurt more and more as I got older so I had to build up the muscles around joints in a particular way to limit it as much as possible (my physio is a genius), and I use strapping fairly generously on my knees and ankles when doing anything strenuous.

Definitely get yourself to the gp ASAP – knees are not easily replaced or repaired so if you’ve got something going on you need every therapy possible as early as you can. Hope it’s nothing too dramatic

[Snitch]

Thanks @kelly. Dislocation is horrible and I don’t want that again in a hurry – or ever! Rather than using ‘Dr’ Google to self-diagnose (and get it wrong), I shall see GP.

[Snitch]

@kelly No, I haven’t either! Although I do think it can be undiagnosed quite a lot as not much was really known about it and the scope of it means that there are quite a lot of symptoms that may or may not present themselves in each case, and the issue changes as we age, meaning more painful and stiff joints which is a red herring in diagnosis.

[Kelly]

Yes you’re probably right about that – I was only diagnosed because the doctor saw the amount of bruises on my legs when examining my achy joints. If it hadn’t have been for the joints I would never have gone to the doctors about always being covered in bruises or passing out fairly frequently

[Doris69]

Ow, ow, ow that sounds completely horrible. Can I contribute my knee problem, not nearly as bad as yours?

I had over the years a very painful knee, one or the other but it always got better for 3/4 days rest and a bandage. Last August my knee was very painful, tender, but not the kneecap and it didn’t go away so I went to GP and had an X ray (almost immediate as my surgery uses the private hospital next door) which showed some wear and tear, but not enough to cause the pain, the GP thought. I was told to do exercises to strengthen the joint. Fast forward. Pain didn’t go away, went back to GP, do more exercises, pain didn’t go away. Went privately to knee clinic where physio thought it probably was arthritis – do more exercises (although I skipped out of that visit quite sound!) Did more exercises. By February I could scarcely walk. On strong painkiller I could take the dog for a short walk and stable duties were bare minimum.
Also some days were worse than others.

So I booked another appointment with the GP and had to wait 2 weeks to see him. I wondered what would happen if I stopped doing the exercises – couldn’t get worse that’s for sure. Well – the pain got better, a lot better. GP dished out stronger painkillers and booked MRI scan.

So out of desperation (not being able to be active and limping around NOT a good look) I visited a Bowen lady in the village. I really had no hopes but was ready to try anything. And – miracle. Since then it has got better and better. She said that there are so many connections around the knee that if something is damaged then it sets up a chain reaction and the whole knee becomes swollen and painful. I have to massage the knee to keep it loose and bath in Epsom salts and rub in some magnesium lotion.

Well, it has worked. I wouldn’t go on a walking holiday and the worst thing is standing around for hours, like a long cooking session, but I can generally say that my knee is mostly OK, thank goodness, such a relief.

[Snitch]

I have never heard of ‘Bowen,’ so just googled it. Interesting and will look to see whether there’s a local practitioner. Thanks for that

I hear what you’re saying about limitations. I think I’ve been a bit complacent and have just been putting up with my knees, partly because I know that after rest, the pain goes off (until the next time). I am going away the week after next though and I am expecting to do a lot of walking so I have been made to think about how my knees are going to cope. I already have a support for the knee that dislocated and I think I will buy another for the other knee, which is actually as bad.

UPDATE: Just found out we have a local Bowen practitioner!

[debby]

I dislocated my patella at the start of last year due to trauma. It was painful initially and the doctor referred me to a consultant who prescribed physio. It would settle and then flare for the next year and then start of this year I popped it out again and have done so 3 times since
I think you need to get your knees looked at and ask for a referral. It takes forever and I almost paid for a private MRI but mine is currently behaving itself.

[Twy]

Another hypermobile one here! Dislocated multiple joints, rather frequently. Find them more stable the fitter I am but have had a massive flare up this year and am now very unfit. Going to slowly up the exercise and see if I can bug gp enough for physio referral and then hopefully I won’t have to wait until consultant appointment in sept.

Any advice appreciated here too as got diagnosed and then told to be careful and that was it …..

[Snitch]

Oh, not good Twy. I think there are two others with the same condition as you on here, so hopefully, they will help.

Feel better soon!

[Twy]

Better than I was 6 months back, was stacking it every time my knee went. Thankfully bit more stable now and on the heavy painkillers but its not a long-term solution, thanks 🙂

[Redders]

I don’t really have any tips per se really, I mean, I use heat a lot as therapy, I’m struggling to find the right pain relief now as have a tolerance to codine. I find trying to keep fit helps, walking is good for bad days, swimming too. Massages are great, as are the oainfree trigger point Pena for the pinched nerves (I get this a lot) and am going to try a tens machine. Decent sleep is really important as it can cause chronic tiredness due to muscles having to work harder to keep everything where it should be. I was referred to a ‘hypermobility group’ physio type thing, but it didn’t really work for me as the others were very down about everything and I found myself feeling dragged down and feeling sorry for myself when I am usually pretty positive and don’t let it stop me doing stuff, even if it hurts. The hardest part is doctors not knowing much about the condition. Don’t let them fob you off, if something isn’t working for you, tell them and ask for something else or do some research and try things that others have said helps, that sort of thing. Sometimes physio isn’t enough, as it was in my case, and it took a lot for me to get the docs to realise this; I was very lucky that the higher level physio took some history and fiddled with my joints and said ‘you need an orthopaedic surgeon’ and I was so happy when he took a look at my scans and fiddled and was like ‘hmm, yes, the only thing to stabilise this is surgery’. It’s a bit of a shame that it took quite a traumatic dislocation to get to this point as I will have had two periods of being on crutches, out of action sort of thing this year, and the surgeon said if I had been referred before the incident, he would have operated and I wouldn’t have done as much damage to my knee with the trauma.

Basically, know your own body and unfortunately, sometimes you have to put up a fight to get what you need!

[ellen]

I have HMS sobhave dislocated or subluxed many joints.
A surgeon had numerous attempts to realign the tracking of my knee caps, but this has made matters much worse!
I was told to try and keep my leg muscles as strong as possible to support the joints and stabilize them ….. I do have to use braces sometimes or crutches when really bad.

I hope you can get some decent help for your condition. Xx

[jasper123]

Another hypermobile one here too! Luckily I have some amazing consultants who look after me…

I dislocated my patella 5 years ago and have sublaxed quite a bit since, have had a lot of physio, an arthroscopy and quite a few doctors giving up! Luckily I saw a Doctor who referred me onto someone else who has looked through my numerous MRIs and xrays and has discovered I am not mechanically correct and it would have been like this since birth. I am now on the wait list for quite major surgery which they are hopeful will stop it happening.

I would suggest getting referred to a knee clinic and explain how it is impeding your life. As I have an office job, one Doctor thought I would be fine if I stopped running. Having to explain that I couldn’t walk properly and could go to work… he finally saw my point of view. You should get a choice of which hospital you can go to, I researched which Doctors ran the clinics and chose which hospital based on that, despite having to wait a bit longer. I am lucky enough to have a private physio who could give opinions on the Doctors.

It is the most frustrating thing, but keep on. A lot of Doctors think that if you don’t keep complaining you are better!

[Redders]

PM me if you prefer, but do you know what procedure they are looking to perform? My surgeon also noticed mechanical imperfections along with my syndrome, apparently they are common together. Shallow trochlear Grove, patella Alta, and small patella, a perfect storm perhaps! It may be that you could have the same op as me, and whilst I am hopeful it will help with my issue, I went into the op with a typical ‘I’ll be fine in a couple weeks’ attitude. Wrong. The recovery is actually a long process and one I severely underestimated! So don’t go into it like I did! I am 5 weeks post op and still can’t really manage stairs, I am still in brace and on crutches, the immediate post op pain (which was shocking as I am used to pain and so also underestimated this!) has waned, but it hurts during and after doing my physio, and sometimes just for the hell of it!
What I am trying to say is make sure you are prepared for how extensive it is- its not a recovery you can cheat into being shorter!

[jasper123]

I will pm you – sounds very similar!

[Just awesome]

Oh the agony!
I have dislocated my left kneecap 7 times now, first in the 90’s and last in 2012. I am 39 now.
Mine is because I have a shallow kneecap that doesn’t fit very well and so does my Dad so it is likely I inherited it (thanks Dad!). The first time it had to be put back in by the Drs in the hospital and without any pain relief and I thought I would die from the pain as it developed cramp. I was a not brave 17 year old then. The rest, fortunately, have gone back in of their own accord but still it is so, so painful!

I have ongoing issues with mine, it limits what exercise I can do and I now have a partial tear in a ligament (can’t remember which one – I want to say meniscus but I may have that wrong) so will likely require surgical repair eventually and one day a new knee.

I was very poor at sticking to my physio in my teens and early 20’s and that has not helped me at all. so my advice is to get as much physio as you can. I wish I had! Feel free to pm for more info.

Oww, oww, oww!

[Author]

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