Pain in the knee joint is a very common phenomenon in a person's life. This can 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 injury, it is subjected to huge daily loads, especially in overweight people. It is also possible the appearance of a symptom during intensive sports, in the context of daily household 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 pain in the knee joint:
- trauma;
- damage;
- dystrophy of one 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 particular case, diagnostic measures are necessary. Pain can be the result of trauma to the elements:
- ligament apparatus;
- tendon formations;
- lesions of the cartilage wall.
For various diseases of the knee, in addition to pain, specific manifestations will be characteristic, determined in laboratory, instrumental and other studies.
Arthritis
If the knees hurt after a long state of rest or heavy loads, then this is arthritis. This pathology of the knee joint is detected in approximately 5-15% of patients who consult a doctor for pain in the joint area.
Do! Arthritis is a disease common to all age groups of the population, but young people are more susceptible to the disease.
A characteristic sign of most arthritis is sharp pain in the knee, that is, an acute onset - within 1-2 days.
Arthritis is an inflammatory process, therefore acute pain in the knee joint is accompanied by such signs:
- edema;
- swelling;
- hyperemia;
- severe pain that gets worse at night.
With arthrosis and damage to the cartilage of the meniscus, pain occurs or intensifies with a motor load on the knee joint, that is, the pain will be relieved if there is nono load on the knee, unlike arthritis. With arthritis, the pain syndrome is of a different etiology, and it will not work to get rid of it by reducing the load and immobilizing the joint. Also, arthritis can affect multiple joints at once, except for the knee.
osteoarthritis
Another very common knee condition, accompanied by severe pain. Pathology is found in 35-40% of people with knee pain. As a rule, this age category is over 40 years old, the left knee and the 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 straighten the knees with a load.
- The pain syndrome disappears if you rest, immobilize the joint.
Over time, without proper treatment, the symptoms are greatly aggravated:
- the seal is deformed;
- there is a crackle when walking or extending the knee.
- the pain intensifies.
The pathogenesis is due to the destruction of the structure, the degeneration of the cartilaginous mucosa of the joint cavity, which leads to deformation of the joint. Primary or age-related osteoarthritis occurs as a result of natural wear and tear of cartilage, secondary - is the result of injuries or a number of other reasons. Such causes can be infectious arthritis, tumor lesions of bone or cartilage tissue, as a result of which this disease can appear in people of different age categories.
menispathies
They are also a common cause of joint pain.
For reference! Of the patients who seek help for pain in the knee joint, approximately 25-35% have meniscal lesions of various etiologies.
This pathology is noted in people of any age, various professional activities, and is equally common in men and women. The menisci are injured during active movements:
- At the moment of injury, a characteristic click is heard, after which it can hurt the knee badly.
- Then a crack or crackle in the knee.
- After that, a sharp pain is felt, which intensifies.
- A person in this state cannot move at all in the knee joint.
The pain may subside after a while and the meniscopathy becomes chronic. But without proper treatment, edema develops, the joint swells and its movements can be blocked, which is accompanied by severe pain and can lead to the development of arthrosis. The risk group is:
- people with gout or arthritis of the joint;
- diabetics;
- people with weak or overweight ligaments.
The disease is diagnosed using computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging and is treated, depending on the severity, conservatively or surgically.
Tendonitis
Tendinitis is an inflammatory process in the tissues of the tendons of the muscle, in the place of their attachment. This disease most often affects active, athletic children and adolescents:
- cyclists;
- basketball players;
- volleyball players;
- athletes.
The disease exists in two forms:
- Tenosynovitis is an inflammation of the tendon sheath.
- Tendinbursitis is a lesion of the tendon sac.
The cause of this phenomenon can be not only an injury associated with active movement, but also such diseases:
- drop;
- arthritis;
- immunodeficiency states;
- Infectious diseases;
- excessive physical activity;
- muscle imbalance of forces acting on the joint.
With tendonitis, the knees hurt paroxysmal, that is, the pain increases with a load on the tendon, in severe forms or in the later stages of the disease, a rupture of the inflamed tendon is possible. The disease is diagnosed in different 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 magnetic resonance imaging can detect the disease.
At the initial stages of the development of the disease, conservative therapy helps, which involves immobilizing the joint with gypsum and restricting motor activity. Different drugs are prescribed:
- tissue repair means;
- anti-inflammatory drugs;
- antibiotics.
Physiotherapy procedures are also prescribed. In advanced cases, with necrosis, surgical removal of dead tissue and plastic tendon formations is performed.
knee bursitis
This is a disease of the articular pockets, 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 cause it:
- skin damage in the knee area;
- open wounds;
- various septic conditions;
- the presence of infection in the blood;
- Overweight;
- increased load on the joint.
Also, 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;
- noticeable changes in the shape of the joint;
- the presence of swelling in the knee area;
- redness;
- great difficulty of movement.
The severity and visibility of these manifestations will depend on the severity and localization of the process.
Depending on the localization of the inflamed joint capsule, there are such types of pathology:
- prepatellar;
- suprapatelyar;
- infrapatellar bursitis.
This pathology, as a rule, is quite easily diagnosed and treated, with the exception of cases of elderly patients, in whom it is chronic and difficult to treat.
Baker's cyst
Another pathological phenomenon of the knee joint, which leads to 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 back surface of the knee region, there is an intertendon bag. Due to the following factors, a pathological effusion forms in the joint cavity, which enters the intertendon sac:
- trauma;
- dystrophic changes;
- inflammatory processes.
As a result, the bag increases, becomes noticeable, and it 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, because the cyst begins 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.
Dissection of osteochondrosis
This disease is also a common cause of knee pain. Normally, the articular 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 mucosa necroses and exfoliates, as a result of which a free body forms in the joint cavity, which causes many problems.
It manifests symptomatically as follows:
- mild pain and discomfort;
- when moving, the pain intensifies;
- swelling may develop.
A fragment of loose cartilage tissue, once in the joint cavity, can interfere with movement, which patients complain about, and when moving, you can hear characteristic clicks or a crunch. After exfoliation, a defect remains on the smooth articular surface, which contributes to the trauma of the joint and in the future will lead to arthrosis or other pathologies.
Doctors consider frequent joint injuries to be the cause of the development of this disease, but sometimes patients have no previous injuries. The diagnosis is based on the methods of computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging and radiographic examination.
gout disease
Gout or gouty arthritis of the knee joint occurs as a result of impaired metabolism, which leads to excessive formation and deposition of uric acid salts, known as urates. They accumulate both in the joint cavity itself and around the 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 sharp deformation of the joint, which leads to a violation, the inability to perform a normal range of motion.
The disease is diagnosed using X-rays and blood tests for uric acid. It is difficult to treat, but at the initial stages of development, special diets and drug treatment are used.
The causes of knee pain can be many different pathologies with completely different etiology and pathogenesis. So, only a medical specialist can answer the question of why the knee hurts 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 endure, because they think that it will pass on its own, it 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, the treatment involves the therapy of the pathology that caused the pain. Based on the results of diagnostic studies, the doctor prescribes appropriate treatment and decides how to treat diseased joints. These can be any of the following methods:
- special therapeutic and preventive exercises;
- ointments;
- compressed.
In case of inflammatory phenomena, anti-inflammatory substances are prescribed, and if there are problems with cartilage tissue, various chondroprotectors or corticosteroids.
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: in order to remove the articular body or resect the affected tissue area. Also, if other therapy is ineffective, knee arthroplasty is used, that is, the replacement of joint elements or the entire joint with an artificial implant. Thus, the answer to the question "what to do if the knee hurts" is an immediate visit to the doctor.