Knee problems

dvescuso

I always seem to come out of a long run or intense week of training with swollen knees and sometimes with a minor strain of some sort. I've gone to specialists about my footwear, and also to correct my running style, but both of these had minor benefits on the knee issue (although getting the right shoe was critical for other reasons). I also realize I'm slightly heavy at the moment, but I'm down 10lbs from Nov and I still get these problems regularly.

A few friends have suggested the following: being more proactive and taking ibuprofen before workouts as opposed to after, taking a joint/cartilage supplement, knee compression sleeves during and/or after workouts.

Has anyone had any success with those things? Is there anything else you can recommend?

Brenda Ross

I would think going to see a physio or doctor to see if you have a medical condition or a muscle imbalance might be a better step then just treating the symptoms, but that is just me. Have you tried that route?

dvescuso

Nope haven't gone down that road yet. I'm at the doctor so much for other reasons that I try and avoid it for extracurricular like this.

But you're probably right, no point in treating the symptoms if there is a major underlying cause, maybe I'll sched an appointment.

Either way, would still be very interested to hear what others with knee issues do to manage them...

Carrie Chavez

Describe the swelling. How soon after workouts does it start? Do your knees hurt during the workouts or when they are swollen? Is your range of motion limited when your knees are swollen?

I personally would not take ibuprofen pre workout to " treat " this. I would want to find out if I have internal derangement in my knee ( meniscus or ligament injury) or muscle imbalance externally causing inflammation. Then I would want to treat those things.

zharveymd

Agree with the advice on withholding antiimflammatories prior to running. Your body hurts to tell you something is up, don't want to silence this and mask making things worse. Also, like anything its hard to make diagnoses on a forum page, but be sure you are stretching your hamstrings often (4 x times a day) and doing hurdler stretches (correctly, safer to do from a standing position) to stretch the quads a patellar tendon. If it turns out to be anterior knee pain then you are doing the fix (and look into adding quad strenghthing exercises and avoid hill running for a while to help) and if it turns out to be something more serious then the stretching probably won't make it worse. And because so much is riding on not doing more harm, it would be worth the time and money to have a sports medicine family doc or an ortho doc to do a quick screen for the stuff that can mess you up when training thru.