Knee Ligament Injury
Your knees are mobile joints that allow you to walk, climb, sit, and kneel. Ligaments stabilize your knee joints for these movements. When you injure a ligament, it may feel as though your knee won’t even hold you up. Fortunately, you and your healthcare team can work together to return you to an active lifestyles.
Two ligaments in the knees are most likely to be injured. The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is in the center of the knee. It is often injured by a twisting motion, such as pivoting wrong or falling awkwardly. This unfortunately is one of the ligaments that I tore. The other ligament, the medial collateral ligament (MCL) is on the inside of the knee. It is normally injured from a blow to the side of the knee. This is common in contact sports such as football and soccer. Injury to either ligament causes pain and weakens the knee joint. Without treatment, the patient may develop many other knee problems that can have lasting effects.
Proper care can make the knee joint stable again. It takes teamwork: you, your doctor, and your physical therapist all working together. Before the knee can be treated, an evaluation is needed. After treatment, the patient plays a large role in the recovery of the knee. An evaluation helps the doctor know how severe the particular injury is. It also points to your best treatment options. The sooner the knee is evaluated. The sooner the patient can be treated, and the better the chance of full recovery. Unfortunately I was unable to get my knee repaired right away. Dr. Freddie Fu informed me that my knee will return to 95% capacity of what it was at before the tear. He informed me that 90% of people never return to 100% utilization of the knee. Dr. Fu also told me that since I am young, active, and healthy this surgery does not present any long term problems with my knee.
A knee ligament injury can be treated in one of two ways: nonsurgically or surgically. Your treatment depends on how severe the individual’s injury is and how active this person hopes to be afterwards. Rehabilitation is a major part of your treatment whether or not you have surgery. I am scheduled to have surgery May 19, 2005 which means I am in for an intensive 6 month rehabilitation assignment after surgery i...
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... actually re-injure the knee. A slight pull in the muscles is what is to be felt, but no pain.
Near the end of rehabilitation, different exercises may be started. Instead of working on certain muscles groups that directly affect the knee, practicing movements that occur natural is beneficial. This prepares the person to return to the chosen sport, work, or pastime. An example of a movement would be a football player running different pass patterns or figures 8’s. Using rubber tubing is exactly what Dr. Fu recommends doing. He explained how hopping sideways with the tube around the waist at slight tension can prepare the knee for sideways motions.
There is a beginning and an end to the formal rehabilitation processes. But, the patient must protect the knee and maintain strength for the rest of there lifetime. Wearing a brace is essential for high-risk involvements and movements, such as the twisting and turning motions common in sports. The physical therapist upon departure of their clinic will give advice and pamphlets on what should be done on a daily basis. Following these directions lead to a healthy, pain-free life.
... It is not completely clear how it is that a tendon becomes a ligament, although Dr. Akizuki thinks that range of motion exercises help the tendon learn that it is being used as a ligament now and that it needs to adopt. Surgeons don't go back in to biopsy the repaired elbow to see how the tissue has changed, but follow-up MRIs show that the new tissue is acting as a ligament should.
In order for athletes to save their active lifestyles they need understand the ACL. The ACL is the most important ligament in the knee because it provides stability to the knee. Athletes have to be aware of the importance of the ACL and know its functions in order to preserve the ligament. The ACL otherwise know as the anterior cruciate ligament is the ligament in the knee that connects the upper leg bone which is the femur to the lower leg bone which is the tibia. The anterior cruciate ligament crosses with the posterior cruciate ligament inside the center of the knee joint to stabilize to the knee in movement.
This case involved a 53 year old man who sustained a significant tear of his rotator cuff while playing baseball. He underwent surgical repair and was given a referral for physical therapy. The referral was to begin passive ROM 3 times per week for 2 weeks then initiate a supervised home program of active exercise for 2 weeks, and elastic resistance exercises for internal and external rotation every other day for a month. 2 weeks after surgery, he had his first PT visit in a sports medicine clinic that was managed by an athletic trainer (ATC).”
A survey was sent to 7,888, and 19.1% of the responses were used for this study. It concluded that almost all ATs either require or recommend their athletes wear ankle tape or braces. Most AT’s currently use tape because the up front cost of a brace is to much, and athletes usually prefer the tape over a brace. An overwhelming amount of ATs believe that ankle braces and taping significantly reduce the athletes risk for injury. Some main take-aways from this survey were that a majority of ATs either encourage or require ankle taping, and the majority of ATs favored bracing over taping to prevent injury, and that most ATs believe that ankle bracing and taping does not impact the athletes’ performance. In conclusion, a majority of ATs encourage some kind of ankle support, and this survey as well as other external evidence should be used when making healthcare
Meniscal tears are a common sports injury, and can vary widely in severity and pain. Meniscal tears are very common among athletes playing contact sports, such as Football, Rugby, and Soccer or any sport that involves twisting of the knee. Meniscal tears are more common among men than woman. Meniscal injuries can occur at any age, but factors differ with age. In older people tears are degenerative and usually occur doing daily activities. In younger people the majority of meniscal tears occur primarily by cutting or twisting movements, hyperflexion, or
To understand the importance of the ACL, the knee as a whole must be examined. The knee is formed by the femur, the tibia, and the patella. Several muscles and ligaments control the motion of the knee and protect it from damage at the same time. Ligaments are dense structures of connective tissue that fasten bone to bone and stabilize the knee. Two ligaments on either side of the knee, called the medial and lateral collateral ligaments, stabilize the knee from side-to-side. The ACL along with the posterior cruciate ligament are of a pair of ligaments in the center of the knee joint that form a cross. T...
When stability weakens there is greater risk for injury because the muscles stop contracting and supporting the joints and ligaments as they should. This can lead to severe joint pain as well as torn ligaments. By using kinesiology tape, injuries like these can be prevented by providing extra support and limiting the strain put on joints and ligaments once the muscle becomes (2014). Effects of Kinesiology Taping on Repositioning Error of the Knee Joint after Quadriceps Muscle Fatigue. Physical Therapy Science 26(6); 921-923.
It can mean losing the chance to get that scholarship for young athletes, and it can also mean the end of those million dollar paychecks for those who have gone professional. A torn ACL can result in numerous surgeries, months of vigorous exercise and rehabilitation, and a sufficient amount of pain. It requires complete patience, as pushing too hard can result in further, more painful injuries. Even after all that, an athlete is not guaranteed he or she will ever be able to play sports again. The anterior cruciate ligament is the reason that the knee only has one pattern of movement.
A 16-year-old, female high school soccer player, Lindsey Robinson, tore her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) during a soccer game. Interestingly, she was not the only one in her team who injured her ACL, but several of her teammates have torn the same ligament as well during the soccer season. Lephart (2002) found that women involved in physical activity are more susceptible to acquiring the ACL injuries than men who are involved in the same physical activity (as cited in Ogden, 2002). According to “ACL Injury Prevention” (2004), the numbers of female ACL ruptures have increased for the past ten years. Over 1.4 million women have suffered from the ACL rupture, which is twice the rate of the previous decade.
There are many injuries in general, but sports injuries? Sprains and Strains are the most common injuries in sports. “Sprains are injuries to ligaments, the tough bands connecting in a joint. Suddenly stretching ligaments past their limits deforms or tears them” (Hoffman 1). Ligaments are like springs in a sense that when you stretch a spring, it will return to it’s normal state unless they are
The majority of ACL injuries suffered during athletic participation are of the noncontact variety. Three main noncontact mechanisms have been identified planting and cutting, straight-knee landing and one-step stop landing with the knee hyperextended. Pivoting and sudden deceleration are also common mechanisms of noncontact ACL injury. Basketball, soccer, and volleyball consistently produce some of the highest ACL injury rates across various age groups. Other activities with a high rate of injury are gymnastics, martial arts, and running. In most sports, injuries occur more often in games than in practice. Many injuries have occurred during the first 30 minutes of play. One-reason physicians are seeing more ACL injuries in female patients that more women play sports, and they play more intensely. But as they continued to do more studies, they are finding that women's higher rate of ACL is probably due ...
The meniscus is one of the most commonly injured structures in the knee. Meniscal injuries can occur in any age group, but causes are somewhat different for each age group. In younger people, the meniscus is fairly tough and rubbery, and tears usually occur as a result of a fairly forceful twisting injury. In the younger age group, meniscal tears are more likely to be caused by athletic activity (Sutton, 1999).
With a jury trial that power is divided between twelve citizens that could come from many different walks of life. This becomes a safeguard against one person acting rashly, without enough information, or with biases. In Document E on the right hand side of the page there is a comment with the caption, “We, the jury, find the defendant to be as guilty as he looks” (Doc E). It seems far more of a danger that a judge should be operating under that principle. If a judge were to rule in these ways that would just be that and the defendant would have to appeal in order to change whatever wrongful decision this judge made. This wastes the defendant’s money, tax payer money, and everyone’s time, not mentioning the intensely disruptive nature that ruling would have in the defendant’s life. In Document C John Gastil and Phil Weiser wrote, “ Jury service [has] a special role of ensuring popular…[oversight in] the judicial process” ( Doc C). Jury service allows everyday people, the exact people who may require fair trials in the future, to have a say over what happens in a courtroom and have the power to weigh evidence and arguments for themselves. Gastil and Weiser later said that, “In theory, elections play a similar role in ensuring, “the people’s
Today juries are much more diverse. Men, women, and people from diverse backgrounds are called to jury duty. Although the origin of the jury system is not clear, history has shown that William the Conqueror from Normandy introduced a similar system to England around 1066 CE (Judiciary of Vermont 1). After the American Revolutionary War, the jury system became the American ideal of justice. This essay will explore the history of the American jury system and illustrate how it has evolved over the course of the American history.
These types of injuries could take upwards to eighteen months to return to playing condition, and in this time an athlete will often fall behind in the sport that they love. This often causes the athlete to quit the sport they once loved because they can no longer truly compete amongst their peers. I know that there has to be a way to accelerate this process of recovery and get those athletes back on the field. This is where my passion for orthopaedics