Knee surgery on the meniscus
Common Questions and Answers about Knee surgery on the meniscus
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There are no long-term studies to prove it, but many doctors believe that successful meniscus repair helps to evenly spread the stress placed on the knee joint. If the knee is protected from uneven force, there is a lower risk of future joint problems.
• Some kinds of tears heal on their own. Instead of surgery, you may try rest, ice, compression, and propping up your knee on a pillow when you sit or lie down.
Recently, after running and following my stretching regime, I have experienced tightening of the knee in question, and then the following morning a swelling at the back of the knee on the medial side appeared. It seems to clear within a couple of days, and in fact does not always return following further running or walking. Do you have any inclination whether this is common following a cartilage op. and do you consider they are even necessarily related?
Thanks for your attention.
Well you have a tear of the meniscus (which is cartilage in your knee that acts as a shock absorber). You have a tear on the inside of your knee and the outside. You have a bone bruise on the front inner portion of the top of your tibia and fluid in your joint (effusion). You really need a knee scope!
Hi,
How are you? The meniscus functions to distribute your body weight across the knee joint. Without the meniscus present, the weight of your body would be unevenly applied to the bones in your legs (the femur and tibia) leading to formation of arthritis.
Diagnosis is made by physical examination, x-ray and MRI of the joint.
There are two methods of treatment: conservative treatment with ice packs, rest, and immobilization. Many people live normal lives despite having a meniscus tear.
A meniscus repair is a surgical procedure done to repair the damaged meniscus. This procedure can restore the normal anatomy of the knee, and has a better long-term prognosis when successful. However, the meniscus repair is a more significant surgery, the recovery is longer, and, because of limited blood supply to the meniscus, it is not always possible.
A meniscectomy is a procedure to remove the torn portion of the meniscus.
The large majority of meniscus tears do not have the potential for healing on their own, and physical therapy does not promote healing of the meniscus. I compare a torn meniscus to a pebble in your shoe. Until the pebble is removed, you are still going to have pain. Once the torn meniscus (the pebble) is removed, you can feel better. The incidence risk of arthritis after arthroscopic partial menisectomy is quite low.
Also you have anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) strain and probably a strain or a tear in the posterior cruciate ligament (PCL). You also have a tear in the body of lateral meniscus and if it involves the white portion of the meniscus, it will not heal by conservative methods. Similar mucoid degeneration of posterior horn of medial meniscus will need to be surgically corrected.
In your case ice, rest, pain killers, physiotherapy, braces etc can be tried.
The first meniscus surgery the doctor tried to repair it but the meniscus ended up tearing again. For the second surgery the doctor removed 30% of the medial meniscus. And now I went to another orthopedic doctor to get a second opinion and it turns out that the meniscus is torn once more in the same place. The doctor wants to remove more of my meniscus but I am scared that if he removes more of the meniscus that I will continue to have problems with my knee and the meniscus.
I have had three surgeries on my left knee, starting with an ACL reconstruction and medial meniscus repair my freshman year of high school, a lateral and medial meniscectomy my senior year of high school, and I just recently had the same surgery, a lateral and medial meniscectomy this past January, 2010.
A bucket handle flops back and forth inside the knee, like the handle on a bucket, and can cause pain, locking, and swelling. This treated arthroscopically and will require either repair or removal of the damaged piece of meniscus.
The second injury is a torn Anterior Cruciate Ligament, (ACL). The ACL is a stabilizing ligament that keeps the femur in concert with the tibia when your body twists on a planted foot.
I just had surgery less than a week ago for both lateral and medial meniscus tears on my right knee. It was really no big deal at all. surgery was on a friday and I was back to work monday. not much pain involved and I am aleready walking w/out crutches after 3 days. I have been avoiding surgery for about 5 years, and now I don't know why. My personal recommendation is to go w/ your orthopedic doctors advice.
a bakers cyst is a fluid filled sac in the back of the knee. inside your knee, providing padding on top of your tibia, there are two "pads" called menisci (medial and lateral) and by the report, it sounds like you have a tear to the lateral meniscus. a grade 3 tear is usually the worst. (grade 1, 2 and 3) truncated means 'short' so a short/small meniscus? (that would be my best guess:) i really dont know about the staying off the legs. and surgery...
Okay, I've been through this for years now, but it didn't start when I was 80 years old. It's not always easy to tell if the injury is a Meniscus tear. Even an MRI can be misleading. Yes, there are many surgeons who cut because they make a lot more money cutting then sending you to PT. I've had a surgeon tell me to arrange a surgery when the MRI showed no evidence of a Meniscus tear. So this is a case where you get one opinion and then you need a second opinion.
I have a question...I fell from a couple of a stairs and tore my lateral meniscus. The orthopedic told me that I have to get surgery because that portion of the tear is not healed. Also he mentioned that the cartilage in my knee is calcifying. So I want to know is the calclifying of my cartilage in my knee a long term risk for my knee?..And if I don't want to do surgery to take out the torn pieces..is it possible that my knee can still heal on its own?
surgery for torn meniscus is done by two methods one is removal of damaged meniscus and the other is repair of the torn meniscus. In the former method there are more chances of developing arthritis and deformity in the knee.
Spondylolisthesis describes the anterior displacement of a vertebra or the vertebral column in relation to the vertebrae below.
A grade II signal in the meniscus on MRI indicates an internal abnormality in the meniscus, but no definite evidence of a frank tear is seen on the images. Therefore, the definitive diagnosis must be made on the basis of all the clinical information and the MRI combined. The further information your doctor will use are the history: did you fall or twist your knee, or did it just started hurting after you got off the stepper? was, or is, your knee swollen? what makes it hurt?
MRI of knee shows "irregularity and hyperense signal in root of lateral meniscus , popliteal fossa cysts, small bakers cyst, myxoid degeneration in lateral meniscus and posterior horn of medial meniscus." ( also mild chondromalacia patella??)
Physician is reccommending arthroscopic surgery.... does this sound reasonable??
There is a small multilobed ganglion cyst situated closer to the posterior root of the medial meniscus- this was also present on the previous study and is unchanged''.
So im guessing they did not do anything with this during the surgery. But is this to do with the lipoma I had externally that was removed? Should I be worried about this? Im guessing not, as they didn't do anything to it during surgery?
Thanks again for all your help.
I have been trying to rehab the knee myself ever since the injury. I don’t think surgery would turn out well for me for the following reasons. 1) Dr. Wants to remove 80% of the posterior horn. 2) removal of 50-75% body/root. 3) some degree of ACL tearing (that will not be addressed). 4) high grade/full thickness articular cartilage loss throughout the medial compartment and elsewhere. I have occasional locking and catching of the knee and I walk with a cane.
The first question is, what kind of surgery did he get? If he got that quick in the office laparoscopy that allows you to go back to activities in two weeks he never actually got the meniscus fixed really. It's quick but it doesn't hold up if you keep doing things that are hard on the knee -- it leaves the meniscus weaker. Actually, all surgeries tend to leave whatever was operated on weaker, as doctors can't usually do better than nature did.
I have severe OA in both knees, but we wanted to treat the meniscus tears in my left knee before we started on the right which has the worse OA. I have been taking synvisc in the right knee, and it is not a cure, at best it will make you more comfortable and buy you some time before you need a replacement procedure. That's my goal, get another few years as knee replacement is recommended at around 55 years of age.
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