You were just walking around the house and suddenly heard a crack. It hurt so bad. It felt like your knee had just been snapped in half. After that episode, knee pain has been there with you every now and then, and it is sometimes very severe.
Sometimes patients experience knee pain as described above. In other cases, it results from trauma, overuse injuries, or a particular event. Regardless of the cause, many patients come into the emergency room daily with knee pain that has never been fully relieved by physical therapy or anti-inflammatory medications. They sometimes need surgery and/or injections to relieve their symptoms. In other patients, oral therapy is enough; they only feel these symptoms once.
In many cases, the pain is related to osteoarthritis. Some patients may have been diagnosed with arthritis at an early age, and it is not uncommon for them to have this condition for most of their lives. Others will not experience any problems until they are older, in their 40’s or 50s.
As noted, knee pain is a very complex topic, and everyone experiences the symptom differently. That’s why we have devoted an entire section of this web to exploring the topic of knee pain. In this first article, we will go through the basics of knee pain and the signs and symptoms that you can experience if you have this problem.