Dislocated Patella - Trampolining :(

hi , my name is tristan ,im a 17 year old girl , im a trampolinist, a gymnast , and a ex-dancer. i dislocated my R patella whilst trampolining almost 3 weeks ago now. A&E reduced it and put me in a cricket-pad splint. but when i got home it dislocated again on its own when i took the splint off to sleep. anyway i pushed it back in before i had a chance to think about it. but my question is will i be able to continue doing my sports? i am competition squad in both gymnastics and trampolining and there my life ! it's all i've ever done. so i was just wondering if you guys could give me a range of proffessional opinions about continuing in these sports. also any excercises you could suggest would be great because my thigh and calf muscle has totally disapeared ! and compared to the other leg it looks alien :eek: ! i am using a zimmer frame and cant put any weight on it. thank you , i appreciate any comments :D:)

Sorry to hear about your injury. A total dislocation of patella is usually managed conservatively i.e. no surgery. The rehabilitation usually takes 12 weeks and given your choice of sport, perhaps a specially tailored program would be appropriate. Failing the rehabilitation, recurrent dislocations of the patella is subjected to orthopedic review. A physiotherapist would be able to provide with you the general guidelines in the specifics of rehabilitation.

It is not uncommon for quadricep muscle to waste following an injury. However, I would suggest that you do try to start to put some weight on your leg! Once again have a talk with a physio regarding the exercises you can do at this point in time.

Good luck.

HI There,

if you're keen to get back to sports i would strongly recommend you see a sports physiotherapist to have a good look at your biomechanics around your knee.. dislocating patellae and patello-femoral joint dysfunction are much more common in women, particularly very flexible types, and require some specific things too be looked at to correct the issue as much as possible. You would definitely need to start getting some range of movement back in your knee and usually a splint is only a very short term measure for this type of injury. A good physio will look at the length of some muscles and structures around the knee, particularly the ITB (ilio-tibial band) length versus the strength particularly of the VMO portion of your quads muscle. the VMO in chronic kneecap dislocators is usually very week and has poor timing and the ITB is very often tight. these 2 factors lead to an increased likelihood of dislocations and subluxations.

You may be advised on a brace for return to sport in the short-medium term too however I'd like to see you walking normally first! please see a good physio for some exercises, massage and stretching of ITB (and that hurts!!! but it works), and restoring the normal movement in your knee, and some very boring routine exercises to strengthen VMO and get your balance back.

Good luck,

msk101

thankyou for your comments :D.... yeh i want to get it moving too. it been 3 weeks and i still cant put weight on it, or bend it....im terrifyed !! ...and yeh i have hypermobility anyway, and my elbows and knees both over-extned and iv dislocated both elbow and now knee ! that mite not have anything to do with it but....

a sports physio ?...hmm they dont come on the NHS do they ?....well my gymnastics coach is a senior physio soo hopefully she should know what to do with me ! problem is i wont be seing her till i go back to gym which according to her is never :(.....

....iv read on the internet that you can opt for surgical repair if your a sports person ? to lesson the likelyhood of it happening again... is this true ? if so how do i go about it ? .... i just get the feeling this isnt quite healing right, i've broken ankles like 5 times and popped my elbow twice and ive always been rather quick recovery ! but this just feels like its not healing correctly, the swelling has gone down, but it looks completely different from my other knee, at the bottom where the patella kind of joins to my shin, theres a large lump of what feels like bone, and its definitly not on the other knee! and the skin on that part is a strange yellow color ...and its scarring me !!....does anybody have any insight to what that could be ???..................thanks again for any comments :D

hi again,

hmm... go see someone. see a physio under NHS and see what they can do for you. it may be worth paying for a once off private sports physio opinion too but it sounds like a proper physical examination is required.

msk101

rite , here i am like almost 8 months down the line following my injury and its not looking good. aparently the 12 weeks and back to sport rule isnt working with me. because i still cant use my knee properly !!! . it keeps partially dislocating if i slightly tilt the knee at an angle ! ... and i still cant put any weight through a bent leg as the knee just buckles and yep u guessed it begins to slide the patella out to the side !! AHHHH , so iv had an mri scan and there doing an arthroscopy ( i think thats what it called ) ,,, to repair or take out any damage.... iv heard people talking about recurrent dislocations , this doesnt sound good , 8 months ive been out of competition !! its completely ruined my competing year !! .. so like if it dislocates again ... will this still hurt ? or will it just be like oh its out ill just push it back in kinda thing ?

if only i could turn back the time and not try having a conversation to my mates whilst practising my routine on the stuipidly pingy trampoline !!!.

It does usually hurt - though on straightening the knee it will often resolve by itself. The more dislocations the less it seems to hurt. But continues to hurt.

In terms of therapy you should be working very hard the structures on the inside of your knee (VMO etc) and you could self mobilise your patella inwards to help stretch out any tightness of the lateral structures (though I don't give this often as a home exercise, but thats because I can do it for them in therapy)