Lateral Meniscus Pain

[iphysio]

Hi Herk_Man. Do you have any locking of your knee? eg. where your knee cannot bend or straighten and you need to shake it a bit to free up the locking. Usually if there is any meniscus tear involved you will have some locking. If you do not have "locking knee", there is a possibility that you may have bruising or "soft tissue injury" of meniscus. Have you tried some anti-inflammatory gel on your knee? Rest sounds good! And gradual return to running. Hope you get better soon!

[Herk_Man]

Thanks so much for the response! No, there is no locking. I have no restriction in movement at all. Even when it starts bothering me while running I could keep going and just pretty much ignore the pain if I had to. But I don't want to make things worse and get to a point where surgery is necessary, if it isn't already.

I wasn't sure if there were even nerve endings in the meniscus or if it was just cartilage so I'm encouraged to hear that you can have soft tissue injuries in the meniscus without any actual tearing.

I don't have any swelling, but in conjunction with the ice and heat I'm taking some Ibuprofen and I do have some Blue Emu gel that is supposed to help with deep tissue injuries that I can start using as well.

I'm already getting cranky from not being able to get out and run so I really want to heal this as quickly as possible! The only saving grace is that Tough Mudder isn't until October so I've got plenty of time to heal and then get back in fighting form. And I can work on upper body requirements while the leg heals.

Thanks again and any other info you can throw at me is sincerely appreciated.

Herk

[iphysio]

Hi Herk. How long have you rested your knee? Is it 4-6 weeks? Is it getting better, worse or same? How would you rate your knee pain out of 10 where 0=no pain and 10= maximum pain when the pain comes on when you run? Can you do a full squat without pain? So far I'm still thinking "soft tissue" / bruising of lateral meniscus. Thanks. iphysio.