Knee joint pain is a very common occurrence in a person's life. It could be due to many factors. As a rule, the main reason is that, due to its anatomical structure, the knee joint is quite vulnerable to injuries, being subjected to great daily loads, especially in overweight people. It is also possible for a symptom to appear during intense sports, in the course of daily domestic or professional activities.
Causes of knee pain
The knee joint consists of many different elements, each carrying its own functional load. Why do my knees hurt? The following factors can cause knee joint pain:
- traumatization;
- damage;
- dystrophy of any of the elements.
Knee pain is a symptomatic manifestation of a large number of diseases of the knee joint. What causes knee pain? To accurately determine the cause in a specific case, diagnostic measures are needed. Pain can be the result of trauma to the elements:
- ligament apparatus;
- tendon formations;
- damage to the cartilage lining.
For several knee diseases, in addition to pain, specific manifestations will be characteristic, determined in laboratory, instrumental and other studies.
Arthritis
If the knees hurt after a long rest or heavy loads, this is arthritis. This pathology of the knee joint is detected in about 5-15% of patients who consult a doctor about pain in the joint area.
Fact that! Arthritis is a disease common to all age groups of the population, but young people are more susceptible to the disease.
A characteristic sign for most arthritis is a sharp pain in the knee, that is, an acute onset - within 1-2 days.
Arthritis is an inflammatory process, therefore, sharp pain in the knee joint is accompanied by such signs:
- edema;
- swelling;
- hyperemia;
- severe pain that gets worse at night.
With osteoarthritis and injury to the cartilage of the meniscus, the pain manifests itself or intensifies with a motor load on the knee joint, that is, the pain will be relieved if there is no load on the knee, unlike with arthritis. With arthritis, the pain syndrome is of different etiology and will not work to get rid of it by reducing the load and immobilizing the joint. Also, arthritis can affect several joints at the same time, except the knee.
osteoarthritis
Another very common knee disease, accompanied by severe pain. Pathology is found in 35-40% of people who come with knee pain, as a rule, this age category is older than 40 years, the left knee and right knee are often affected at the same time. Severe pain may not appear immediately, but the sensations gradually increase over time: for someone a week or two, for someone - for a month. Unlike arthritis, the knee only hurts when you put a load on it:
- At first, a person feels pain after a long walk.
- Over time, even walking short distances brings a lot of discomfort.
- Later, the patient has great difficulty going up and down stairs.
- It is difficult to get up from a chair, that is, to bend the knees with a load.
- The pain syndrome disappears if you rest, immobilize the joint.
Over time, without proper treatment, the symptoms are much worse:
- the joint is deformed;
- there is a crackling sound when walking or extending the knee.
- the pain intensifies.
The pathogenesis is due to the destruction of the structure, degeneration of the cartilaginous lining of the joint cavity, which leads to joint deformity. Primary or age-related osteoarthritis occurs as a result of the natural wear and tear of cartilage, secondary - it is the result of injuries or various other reasons. Such causes can be infectious arthritis, tumor lesions of bone or cartilaginous tissue, so this disease can appear in people of different age groups.
meniscopathies
They are also a common cause of joint pain.
For reference! Among patients who seek help due to pain in the knee joint, about 25 to 35% have meniscal injuries of various etiologies.
This pathology is observed in people of any age, various professional activities and is equally common in men and women. Menisci are injured during active movements:
- At the time of injury, a characteristic click is heard, after which the knee can sharply hurt.
- Then a crunch or crepitus in the knee.
- After that, a sharp pain is felt, which intensifies.
- A person in this state cannot move in the knee joint.
The pain may subside after a while and the meniscus disease becomes chronic. But without proper treatment, swelling develops, the joint swells and movements can be blocked, which is accompanied by severe pain and can lead to the development of osteoarthritis. The risk group is:
- people suffering from gout or arthritis of the joint;
- diabetics;
- people with weak ligaments or overweight.
The disease is diagnosed by CT or MRI and treated, depending on the severity, either conservatively or surgically.
tendinitis
Tendinitis is an inflammatory process in the tissues of the muscle tendons, at the site of their attachment. This disease most often affects active children and adolescents, athletes:
- cyclists;
- basket players;
- volleyball players;
- athletes.
The disease exists in two forms:
- Tenosynovitis is an inflammation of the tendon sheath.
- Tendbursitis is an injury to the tendon bursa.
The cause of this phenomenon can be not only an injury associated with active movement, but also diseases:
- drop;
- arthritis;
- immunodeficiency states;
- infectious diseases;
- excessive physical activity;
- muscular imbalance of forces acting on the joint.
With tendonitis, the knees hurt in a paroxysmal way, that is, the pain increases with a load on the tendon, in severe forms or in the most advanced stages of the disease, a rupture of the inflamed tendon is possible. The disease is diagnosed in several ways, sometimes it can be detected by laboratory methods, for example, when the cause is an infection.
But if the cause is gout or inflammatory processes in the joint itself, radiographic research methods and MRI can detect the disease.
In the early stages of the development of the disease, conservative therapy, which involves immobilizing the joint with a plaster cast and restricting motor activity, helps. Various drugs are prescribed:
- means for tissue repair;
- anti-inflammatory drugs;
- antibiotics.
Physiotherapy procedures are also prescribed. In advanced cases, with necrosis, the surgical removal of dead tissues and plastic formations of the tendons is performed.
knee bursitis
This is a disease of the joint bags, characterized by an inflammatory process and the presence of exudative fluid.
For reference! The causes of bursitis are constant and excessive stress on the joint.
If we talk about pathologies of an infectious nature, the following factors can be the cause:
- skin damage in the knee area;
- open wounds;
- various septic conditions;
- the presence of an infection in the blood;
- overweight;
- increased load on the joint.
In addition, the pathology is secondary, as a complication of gouty disease or arthritis of the knee joint. Like any inflammatory process, bursitis will be accompanied by symptoms:
- pain syndrome;
- visible changes in joint shape;
- the presence of swelling in the knee area;
- redness;
- great difficulty in movement.
The severity and visibility of these manifestations will depend on the severity and location of the process.
Depending on the location of the inflamed joint capsule, there are these types of pathology:
- prepatellar;
- suprapatellar;
- infrapatellar bursitis.
This pathology, as a rule, is quite easily diagnosed and treated, with the exception of cases with elderly patients, in which it is chronic and difficult to treat.
Baker's cyst
Another pathological phenomenon of the knee joint, which brings a lot of pain and problems. The cyst is also called a popliteal hernia, it is a protrusion in the popliteal fossa. Normally, between the tendons, the gastrocnemius and semimembranosus muscles, on the posterior surface of the knee region, there is an intertendinous bursa. As a result of the following factors, a pathological effusion is formed in the joint cavity, which penetrates into the intertendinous bursa:
- trauma;
- dystrophic changes;
- inflammatory processes.
As a result, the pouch enlarges, it becomes noticeable, and this is called a Baker's cyst. In the early stages of development, it may be invisible, not cause obvious discomfort, that is, it is asymptomatic. Later, due to the increase in size, the knee hurts a lot, as the cyst starts to compress the nerves and blood vessels, and the mobility of the joint is also impaired. Bending movements become difficult and are also accompanied by severe pain.
osteochondrosis dissecans
This disease is also a common cause of knee pain. Normally, the joint surfaces that make up the knee joint are lined with cartilage. This pathology is caused by the fact that a small area of the cartilaginous lining becomes necrotic and exfoliates, resulting in the formation of a free body in the joint cavity, which causes many problems.
It manifests itself symptomatically as follows:
- mild pain and discomfort;
- when moving, the pain intensifies;
- swelling can develop.
A fragment of cartilaginous tissue loosened, once in the joint cavity, can impede the movement, which patients complain about, and when moving, you may hear characteristic clicks or pops. After exfoliation, a defect remains on the smooth joint surface, which contributes to joint trauma and in the future will lead to osteoarthritis or other pathologies.
Doctors consider that frequent joint injuries are the cause of the development of this disease, but sometimes there are patients who do not have previous injuries. Diagnosis is based on computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging and X-ray examination methods.
Drop
Gout or gouty arthritis of the knee joint occurs as a result of impaired metabolism, which leads to the excessive formation and deposition of uric acid salts, the so-called urates. They accumulate both in the joint cavity itself and around cartilage and tendons and cause inflammation.
With the disease, there is severe pain in the joint, the knee area turns red and swells. If gout becomes chronic, urate deposits cause a clear deformity of the joint, which leads to a violation, the impossibility of performing a normal range of motion.
The disease is diagnosed with the help of x-rays and blood tests for uric acid. It is difficult to treat, but in the early stages of development, special diets and drug treatment are used.
The causes of knee pain can be different pathologies with completely different etiology and pathogenesis. So, only a specialist doctor can answer the question of why the knee hurts for sure after diagnosis.
General principles of treatment
Everyone wonders if the knee hurts, what to do? Many people, with the appearance of mild pain, discomfort, prefer to bear it, because they think it will go away on its own, this should not be done. The knee joint hurts because it is a manifestation of various pathologies, and in the absence of timely and adequate therapy, these pathologies can lead to serious consequences.
If the knees hurt, treatment involves therapy for the condition that caused the pain. Based on the results of diagnostic studies, the doctor prescribes the appropriate therapy and decides how to treat the diseased joints. These can be the following methods:
- special therapeutic and preventive exercises;
- ointments;
- compresses.
In case of inflammatory phenomena, anti-inflammatory substances are prescribed, and if there are problems with the cartilage tissue, various chondroprotectors or corticosteroid drugs.
For reference! It is possible to perform a puncture, both for diagnosis and for treatment, for example, in the case of Becker's cyst.
Sometimes, with advanced pathology, surgical treatment is indicated, which is also diverse. In most cases, they resort to arthroscopic operations: to remove the articular body or to resect the area of affected tissue. In addition, if another therapy is ineffective, knee arthroplasty is used, that is, the replacement of joint elements or the entire joint with an artificial implant. So the answer to the question "what to do if your knee hurts" is an immediate visit to the doctor.