Masters runner needs help with knee injury

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If you are over 40 you probably have a torn meniscus. I would go see somebody and get an MRI done. It almost always requires surgery and it is pretty easy outpatient surgery. I tried to run through about 3-4 months of knee pain, had it checked out. Torn meniscus. Had the surgery about a week later and was back running after one week down. I am kicking myself for waiting so long when it was such a simple fix.

Thank you for that information. I hope that is it.

Where the pain is located is a pretty good indicator of what you are dealing with. A torn meniscus is usually felt on the medial knee (inside) and sometimes on the back of the knee. There is also going to be stiffness or swelling and sometimes it can crack of pop. But a very minor tear can just hurt.

There is also patellar tendinitis which should be called "master's runner's knee". That will usually present itself with pain on the knee cap where it connects with the patellar tendon. It take a long time to shake patellar tendinitis because that part of the knee does not get much blood flow.

And there are plenty of other knee problems. An MRI is a good idea if your ortho does not have a lot of confidence with what is going on.

Eccentric quad strength is probably the best exercise for any sort of tendon issue on your knee. Get on a quad press machine and lift (extend your leg) the bar with both legs or just your good leg. Then hold the bar with the injured leg as you very slowly retract your leg to return it to the starting position.

Thank you. The pain is on the front of the left knee and there is a popping sound when I use the leg to lift weights

I had my PT recommend Quad Press Machine exercises, among other things, for a major quadricep injury I was rehabbing.

They told me to do each leg independently, and do 3 sets of 10 reps at a weight that would allow me to do at least 10 of them without fatiguing. Do both legs so that you don't develop one leg stronger than the other, but understand that there will be less weight on the injured one. Also, they said to only do the first half of the press, not full extension. Ease into this gradually and stop if any pain. And understand that I only did this after seeing the doc and the pt therapist.

Don't rely on an internet diagnosis. Go to an orthopedist.

The best treatment for this is electric stimulation with a heating pad. That will stimulate the blood flow. You can do that as much as twice a day, 30 minutes each.

I have a similar issue at the moment - a sharp pain on the inside of my right knee. after 3 weeks of on/off running I finally went to the doctor. I have to get a referral before I can see a specialist. The clinic doc said it’s probably a torn meniscus and I agree. Got the referral, and the orthopedic doctor told me it probably was arthritis (because I run a lot and am in my 60s). He told me he would do an xray and when I asked him why not an mri because an Xray wouldn’t be able to detect any muscle or cartilage issues he got pissed and told me I should go to another doctor if I wanted to question him 😂. He also said if I did an mri for sure you would see tearing but that wouldn’t necessarily correlate with the reason for the pain. anyway the xray showed my bones were all good, probably not arthritis, so he gave me some meds to alleviate any swelling, no running for a week, and then come back.

The older I get, the more I realize that sometimes it's best to suck it up and get an MRI. I think this is one of those cases.

The downside of not getting a proper diagnosis is that you end up in this state of guessing what the injury is and trying different therapies that may or may not work, potentially wasting months. I know this from firsthand experience.

Thanks for all of the advice. I will try to get an MRI as soon as possible and try to jog as much as I ca to retain some fitness