It has now been 2 years and 2 months (not that I’m counting!) since my partial knee replacement and it’s still bothering me. The knee joint itself feels pretty good, the part that bothers me is the area around the top and to the outside of my patella. All of my experimental methods of cupping, wedging, dry needling, massage…the list goes on, has not quite hit the spot. I even gave some low-level laser treatment a try for three weeks to see if that could have any impact, but sadly it didn’t help.
So, my next port of call was to see a Sports Physician to see if they had any different ideas. I had a telehealth call (the new world of Covid-19 that we are living in) with a Doctor from Melbourne Olympic Park Sports Medicine who has seen a lot of knee injuries from working with the Australian Netball team. She had some really good information about some other options, but wanted to also get input from my physio and surgeon. So off I went last week to sit in the dreaded surgeon’s waiting room again with fresh x-rays and ultrasounds in hand.
I had mixed feelings about seeing my surgeon again. He was either going to a) sharpen his scalpel as he sees me walk in, or b) tell me this is as good as it’s going to get so you need to learn to live with it. Both involves pain.
Given this orthopaedic surgeon specialises in hips and knees I was convinced that he would have seen plenty of people like me before and that he would have the answer for me. After the small talk was done it took him just 5mins to identify the cause of my pain. Why didn’t I come and see him earlier?
With the resetting of my patella into the correct groove during my last surgery, it now tracks in its correct alignment however one of my quadriceps tendons is now exposed and is causing friction against the femur bone creating pain and scar tissue. Bingo!
So my surgeon is now sharpening his scalpel for my next visit which will be minor surgery to clean that particular space around my patella. In fact, he said it would be so minor that I would be walking out of the hospital the same day as the procedure and I won’t miss a day of work. Sounds simple, let’s hope he’s right and that it’s third time lucky for me.
