Answers to Questions About Arthroscopic Knee Surgery

I had authoscoptic knee surgery 5 months ago , why are they telling me I have to take 2,000 millagrams of arthromission before I have my teeth cleaned , just a normal cleaning , had other surgeries never had to do that , please answer before Monday …Thank you

You should ask your doctor why this is being asked of you. In general, antibiotic prophylaxis is only needed after joint replacement surgery:
http://orthopedics.about.com/od/hipkneereplacement/f/antibiotics.htm

Regards,

Jonathan Cluett, M.D.
About Orthopedics

If after having had discomfort and pain for over two months, the knee feels better, should artroscopic surgery still be done? The MRI states extensive tear of the body and posteriorhorn of the medial meniscus and significant hyaline cartilage pathology in the medial compartment on the femoral side.

If there is no pain or discomfort than there is often no need for surgery. Many patients have meniscus tears, but no pain. If this is the case, then surgery is often not needed. This is something you should discuss with your doctor.

Regards,

Jonathan Cluett, MD

I slipped and fell down the stairs in my home one week ago. During the fall, I hit my knee on the stair railing. I have two bruised on the top of my knee where it hit. When I landed – my right knee was bent at a 45 degree anlge and my foot behind me. X-rays showed no broken bones, etc. I still have severe pain – even with ant-inflammatories, pain meds, ice, and elevation. The pain is constant – not just when I walk or bend the knee. I can isolate a very tender spot on the inside of my knee. Can you give me any indication of what could be injured and if surgery is probable?

I had arthroscopic knee surgery a week ago today. I thought it was a minor surgery but was in extreme pain the night of the procedure and moderate to severe pain thereafter. A couple of days after the procedure, the knee seemed better but there was a huge knot in my calf. It was so painful that it turned my stomach. I tried icing, elevating and everything I could think of. My doctor says I require a total knee replacement. I don’t think so. The physiotherapist said that the inflammation had travelled down into my calf and that was the problem. Is that a sign of a blood clot??

I have had knee pain for roughly a year and have decided to have surgery even though my mri shows nothing. along with the pain there is mild swelling and buckling and catching in my knee. Do you think the surgery is the right way to go?

I have been on anti-inflammatories since May with no relief in sight..the pain when I drive more than 10 minutes is horrible. The orthopedist says I should have the arthoscopic done…I thought this was a test not actual surgery. Should I do this?

I had arthroscopic surgery 6 weeks ago to clean up a torn meniscus and rough bone…It actually feels worse now than before. I cannot walk for more than 5-10 minutes without severe pain. I’ve had physical therapy, acupuncture and do stretches and exercises at home daily. I’m at a loss now for what to do next. Any ideas?

I have had two arthrocscopic knee surgeries. First one 6 years ago in Palm Springs. There were two torn menicscus repaired. I was walking and did not need anything but asprin for a couple days. This time was 10 weeks ago. I am getting better but still in pain. There was a torn menicscus and arthritis. I don’t understand what has happened.

I had my ACL replaced a few years ago. Since then I have had off and on issues behind my knee in the “fold” of my leg. It feels like a ligament or meniscus is catching on something and won’t allow me to straighten my leg. It is very painful and causes swelling. Usually I sit down and slowly straighten my leg, then something pops and everything is fine again. However, the most recent episode happened about two weeks ago and isn’t getting better. Any ideas of what the issue is? Thanks!

Can anyone help me? I tripped and twisted my left knee in Aug of 06. I had problems with my knee catching.I would have to wiggle my leg around to get it to let loose.I then went to an orthopaedic Dr. who had me get x-rays which showed nothing then an mri which again showed nothing.At this point on nov of 06 we agreed to do orthoscopic surgery.I had some synovial fluid removed and what he called a small abnormality.I then fell down the stairs in Dec of 06 and again had problems with catching so i had 7mo of P.T. which didnt help.I then had another mri which to my dissapointment showed nothing again.The Dr. and i decided to go ahead and on june 18th 0f 08 try another scope surgery where he cleaned out a little stuff.I’am still having lots of catching in my knee sometimes very painfull.I think my Dr. is very good and he seems to be at a loss as much as me at this point.He said the knee looked good when he went in.WHAT IS GOING ON THEN???? This is affecting my opportunity for job advancement and my everyday activities!! Please help!! Thankyou,
Maria

Is there any way that I could have been living with a torn acl without knowing it? I have to fight worker’s comp from a fall I took in April this year. I saw a doctor for knee pain last July, no exam, no tests, no further contact, but they’re saying “pre-existing condition” HUH??
Isn’t there a way to tell that it was a “fresh” tear or old injury? (even if I’m wrong?)

Not all people with ACL tears will have symptoms. In fact, it is quite common for people to feel much better after recovering from the acute pain of an ACL tear.

Studies can be done to determine if an ACL tear is a new injury (within about 8 weeks old), but after that time, most ACL tear will look the same. Determining when a tear occurred is best accomplished by taking a careful history from a patient to determine when the knee was injured.

Regards,

Jonathan Cluett, M.D.
About Orthopedics

I have experienced knee pain for the last 2 years. I do not remember the injury happening, just that for a few weeks I was in a lot of pain. The pain subsided and now is only a problem when walking upstairs, cycling and walking after sitting down for a period of time. I tried to kick a soccer ball around in the park and when I bent my leg from a standing position away from my body (about waist height) in a quick motion to control the ball I had a shooting pain through my leg and I could not stand up for a few minutes.I have had an x-ray and MRI and it showed fluid in the inner part of my right knee but no tear/damage. I had arthroscopic knee surgery and the knee was cleaned out and some cartilage removed but this was a guess said my doctor as the knee looked fine. I have recovered from surgery and the problem is the same as it has always been. Even my physio cannot help. Any ideas what I have done or what I can do to fix this?

A month ago I fell and struck my knee. Lots of pain at first. I cannot put pressure on my knee and now have an accumulation of fluid on my knee. Should I see a doctor?

about 1 month ago while playing basketball i fell n realized that i could,nt stand on my left leg. when i went to the doctor he told me i had an acl tear but he did,nt tel me anything about the surgery.but now i can move my leg to n fro i have no swellings n i dont seem to have any pain is it necessary 4 me to do a surgery or can i jus go 4 a physiotheraphy doing knee exercises n complete rest for 2 months can it cure ma knee

I had arthroscopy on both knees 9 weeks ago. The surgeon said he was pleased with the results and that I should have no further problems and be able to return to dancing. I have returned to work (teaching), been doing the exercises prescribed by the physiotherapist, and taken gentle walks. I am beginning to feel the sensations of tightness and slight pain in the knees that I had before the operation. Please advise: I am getting quite depressed about this.

hi i’ve recently had surgery on my right knee the doctor said that he had to clean vertical and horintal tears in my medial miniscus. the problem i hda be for surgery was i couldnt kick a soccer ball which is a huge issue for me since soccer is my passion. i’m at 4 weeks after surgery an i have this bad feeling its not fixed but i have not challenged it eighter… any thoughts would be appreciated
thanks
nick

I had surgery on my knee about 3 weeks ago and am worse than I was before surgery. I had what was told to me a simple scope and medial miniscus surgery and after I saw my doctor he released me back to work with no restictions. I am having a hot shooting pain down my leg and it feels like I have no stability in the knee. I told my dr. I had a hard time getting to the office that day and he said nothing about it. I now am off work again and can not carry anything when I walk because of the pain. My knee feels like everything below is jambing up into it and I need my cruches to walk any distance. Any help here???

I had arthroscopic knee surgery in 2003 due to an injury. Since I have been triggering metal detectors at airports, which has been a bit of a hassle. To my knowledge my simple procedure did not include any metal installations, and found no evidence when reviewing my operation procedure details. Personel wanding indicated metal in my knee on every occurence, and was passed off by security as “we have a knee”, and I was then allowed to continue. Any ideas on what may have been installed during my arthoscopic surgery, and should I have been told clearly by my surgeon? Thanks

I had arthroscopic surgery done on my right knee approx 3.5 yrs ago to clean up torn meniscus. Before, I just had tightness in my knee,now I have tightness and pain. I think they clean out the knee so much that there is no buffer between leg bones. What I’m left with is bone on bone and significant pain while skiing which I love to do. I’m very sorry I had surgery.

hi had this problem with my knee that seems to settle down before returning out of nowwhere!! I plau soccer and it is really fustrating! the sensation is that of a catching/crunching feeling, which prevents full extension of my righ leg! this problem also gives me pain deep in the underside of my knee. Just wondering what advice i should take on the matter?

I had surgery on july 27th for a total knee reconstruction my mcl pcl and acl. i did everything the drs suggested therapys i thought i did everything right but i had an mri a week ago and it comes back to my dr stating that i dont have an acl so im thinking did he replace that one the first time around. Well he wants to perform another surgery for that and he cant give me an explaination on why its missing he wants to replace it with an alograph i think thats what its called. can someone answer this please thank you…

my daughter had knee surgeon
she torn her meniscus n her acl which was fix by having a c. graft and she torn her anterior cruciate ligament. the docter fix everything but said she had to wait one year before she can play any type of games is this right because this means she will miss next year to in school games

Dear Sir: On December 2008, I had knee surgery by artheroscopy method for torn meniscus in the rt. knee. Still, I had severe pain in my rt.knee especially after sitting for while. When I get-up, I can not put pressure on my knee– lots of pain. After some time the pain subsides and sometime it remains. I thought, after artheroscopy, the pain goes away 95%. Can some one out there can tell me what to do next. Do I have to live my whole life with pain. I was advised by someone to try Synvisc injections.Thanks

I just saw my surgeon a couple of days ago and he suggested an arthoscopic surgery. I’ve had one done 6yrs ago by someone else and it was good for few yrs then I started getting pains when I squat down which I can’t do anymnore. I’ve been having pains toward the inside of my Right Knee especially while in driving in slow traffic also while sitting for long.
I had an MRI and it showed that I have a Baker’s Cyst also as my dr showed me lots of inflamation around my knee. He wants to get in and see what’s going on.. the MRI did’nt show a meniscus tear per say but he said I could have one but again he wont know till he looks in. I was determind not to go for it and leave it alone for now but my therapist which I trust with my life he adviced me to go for it since he’s a great dr and the longer I wait, I can develop artheritis which I don’t want..
So, after finally changing my mind about it after talking to a lot of people and I was reading all the postings here today while I was waiting from someone from the dr’s office to call for a date for surgery then I guess all of the readings here got me scared and I kind of backed out especially that I have an event to attend in June and I’m travelling for it and don’t want to not enjoy it in case something goes wrong or I’m not feeling well.

The nurse gave an appt for April 22nd but I decided to wait till July after my event..
Am I being silly or ridiculous or I’m right!

Please I need someone’s opinion on this…
Thanks so much..

God bless..

I hurt my knee jumping and landing akwardly playing baseball. it swelled up and the x-rays were negative. I was told i had a sprain and waited 10 days before i scheduled another appointment because i wasnt healing and cant bend my knee. My doc told me i needed orthoscopic knee surgery and that i had a miniscus tear. I never had an MRI done so how can any doctor tell me i need surgury before even knowing exactly whats wrong?

I had arthrospcopic surgery done on my right knee Jan. 22nd. My surgeon said he did a grade II/III chondroplasty. He also said he has never seen so much arthritis in someone as yound as me (im 30). My knee still keeps swelling and it hurts all the time and I thought the surgery would fix it but why am I still in so much pain. He has me taking 400mg of Aleve b.i.d but that doesnt help what can I do to get out of pain?

About 1 ½ years ago, I had anthroscopic surgery to clean up a torn meniscus in my right knee. In the post-surgery follow ups, the surgeon said everything seemed to be healing fine. But months later, I returned to the surgeon complaining that I couldn’t fully extend my knee or flex it. He told me to sit in a chair, and work on bending it back and told me I would be fine. Months later, I returned to my sports med doc to explain about not being able to fully extend my knee or flex it. If I sit on the floor and extend both legs out, my right knee sits up higher off the floor than the left. It seems tightness in my upper calf, behind my knee (the area in the back of my knee in the bend) and my lower hamstring seems to be preventing me from fully flexing my knee. If I kneel on the floor and try to go back on my heels, I can’t. When I walk for more than 30 minutes, the tightness builds. I stop to work it out by bending my knee, bringing my foot to my butt. If I stand for any length of time, the tightness returns. Getting into a car is difficult because it’s hard to bend my knee because of this tightness/tenderness.

My doc referred me to physical therapy. After more than six months, three different PTs worked on some bio-mechanical issues but the tightness behind my leg persisted.

The irony is that I was able to return to running. Granted, my runs are much slower. I suspect because I’m not running efficiently. I was able to run my annual fall marathon. Slowly, of course. The last six miles is always hard but I could feel the tightness in the upper calf, behind my knee and lower hamstring.

Afterwards, I went in search of answers for this issue. Because traditional PT didn’t have an affect, I went to a kinesiologist/sports trainer who is a convert of what’s called Z-health. I was willing to give non-traditional therapy a shot. His advice about dumping my orthotics and running in Nike Free, including marathons, seemed a bit out there for me. But he was able to get me to reactivate my glutes, which my sports med doc had hopes that the traditional PT could fix. And he worked on engaging my abs and getting my breathing to go deeper. But again, no fix for the tightness behind my leg.

So four weeks ago, I decided to try a different hamstring stretch in hopes of returning better flexibility and maybe ending the tightness. Instead, I did something very wrong and pulled the muscle. I haven’t been able to run for four weeks. Kind of makes me mad because at least I could run before.

I’m extremely frustrated because it seems there should be an answer to this problem. Last year, my sports med doc gave me a cortisone shot in my knee and I was able to finally able to extend my leg enough to walk down steps without a limp. I’m thinking about going back and getting another shot in hopes maybe it would cure the rest of my problem. But it seems foolish when no one seems to know what the problem is.

Sorry about the length of this comment but I wanted you know what’s been done. I’ve never posted on a blog like this but at this point, I figure I have nothing to lose.

Thanks.

i had arthroscopic knee surgery to remove the plica from my rt. knee in december of 2008 and i did pt for about 2 and 1/2 months and i just recently got released from my doctor about 2 weeks ago but my knee is still killing me. it never hurt when i was at the doctor and i couldn’t really explain it in a way that he could understand. i played softball for a city leauge for about 2 months… but why is it still bothering me what should i do??

I had arthroscopic knee surgery 15 weeks ago
and still have problems walking, the knee
swells up and painful and if I sit for awhile it stiffens up and extremely painful while i’m
trying to straightened it out. Doctor claims it will be afew more months for healing.
I had a torn cartilage and scaping of arthritis.

Good advice from everyone. To help answer one or two questions I was told by my physical therapist that after you get your ACL replaced (I got cadaver parts) that over the next 6 weeks it actually gets weaker b/c your body has to basically “receive” it, grow blood vessels thru it and all…and that it would be weak for a while after but should not cause more pain. I had my ACL replaced and 2 other ligaments that I tore completely with cadaver parts. I had surgery just on Monday and yes I know I”m on pain meds, but I can already tell you my knee feels better! It hurts less with all these staples and all in it walking than when I was walking around w/ it injured. My Dr. actually showed me my MRI and gave me all the pros/cons of having surgery and not having surgery. I’m 31, so I decided to have the surgery since I will recover quickly. I also did PT for a month before my surgery, which helped prepare my leg muscles so I think that’s helping with the pain.

Had a lateral release done along with extensive cleanup of torn cartalidge in my left knee in February. The doctor was hoping to buy me some time before having to do a knee replacement. Four months later I am still in lots of pain, trouble even more with stairs and the knee catches and gives way even more now. I am only 44 which is partly why they are waiting, should I push for the replacement?

I had arthroscopic surgery for meniscus repair 10 months ago. My knee still clicks and is painful to unclick, it swells, I cannot extend it fully and from knee down is most of the time numb and tingly. What is wrong and why has it not healed properly by now. I even lost 25 pounds since surgey to see if that would help.. but no difference

I have been having swelling in pain of my right knee for two months, with no apparent cause of injury. My primary care physician ordered an x-ray, which was normal. I was referred to an ortopedist, who ordered an MRI. The radiologist report stated there were no problems, so I have been doing physical therapy for 5 weeks with no relief. I returned to the ortophedist to have him take another look at the MRI, and he believes there is a problem with my PCL. I injured the right knee about 14 years ago, and have had minor issues with it since – occasional pain or minor swelling. My ortophedist believes the PCL was injured in the previous incident, with my tibia sitting too far back and causing my to rub and cause my swelling and pain.

He is recommending arthropsopic surgery to try and repair any damage to the PCL. In searching online, I see that this is fairly uncommon, and used only in acute injuries. My pain and swelling are definitely problematic, but not severe. I am young and would prefer to have any problems fixed now, but I am uncertain if the surgery is the best way to go. With no relief from physical therapy, are there other options to consider to bring me relief without surgery?

To Tricia:
Could the swelling possibly be from Arthritis? I would have that ruled out first before surgery.

I had arthroscopic knee surgery for a torn medial miniscus a month ago. I still have a lot of pain and stiffness in the knee joint, and sometimes sharp pain in my kneecap. My quad muscle does not seem to be working right, going down stairs is a real problem. I went to the doctor two days ago and he thought everything seemed to be okay and that I just needed to keep bending it and trying to work out the pain, he even suggested running,so I tried and almost fell down. I am seriously thinking about getting a second opinion. I have had several friends that had the same thing done and did not have these problems. Has anyone else had the quad muscle problem ? It just tends to give out at times, and is very sore.

I hurt my knee playing basketball and the MRI indicated that I have torn cartilage and will need arthroscopic surgery. How long after surgery will I be able to resume activities?

My son has a broken anterior knee ligament and a torn meniscus at the “cuerno” horn? He has had an MRI and he has been told that he has to have knee surgery. We are considering having it done privately here in Spain as the waiting list for the op is very long and my son is returning to do his last year Uni on 1st October to do his practicals in Dental School. However, we plan to fly to the USA end of August. What I would like to know is, how much would it cost to have an op in the USA and what is the recuperation time?

I had Arthroscopic surgery 2 weeks ago I still have locking of the knee when getting off couch or getting out of car what does this mean?

Hello. I just received my MRI Results indicating that I have a 100% in my ACL and in the medial compartment, I have an oblique tear in the posterior horn of my Meniscus.

The doctor did not tell me much. All he told me was that I was getting knee surgery and that I would have a consultation with an Orthopedic Surgeon in two months.

Can you give me a timeline of what I should expect down the road before my Surgery and post-surgery?

I’m having a 2nd arthoscopic knee surgery in 2 days. I’m very scared because I had the 1st one almost a year ago, and my knee has been painful and my quality of life has deteriorated! Why does a surgery make you feel worse? My new doctors seems to think that he wll be able to help me, and I hope and pray that after this surgery I will be able to “dance” again the way I used to before my 1st surgery! I hope I’m making the right decision!!!

1.)I had arthroscopic knee surgery 5yrs ago and still have problems walking, the knee swells up and painful and if I sit for awhile it stiffens up and extremely painful while I’m trying to straightened it out.
2.)Now my right knee is bending inward almost touching the left, can this be corrected with surgery, a therapies or wearing a brace?

Both of my fathers knees are bone to bone. He is 89 years old and is too old for knee replacement. What else can be done ? He has braces for both knees, but still has so much pain. He had 5 shots done on his left knee, and t. We have had xrays and it does show bone to bone on both knees.that did not help all that much. He has always been a very active man. He also played golf about three days a week until a week ago. That is when the other knee started hurting him. The xrays show bone to bone on both knees. What can be done to allow him to stay active and enjoy what life he has left?