Torn miniscus options

My son had a torn miniscus when he blew his ACL playing football. I don’t think you can do anything short of surgery. He couldn’t straighten his leg because the flap from the tear impeded full extension. It won’t repair in its own and after surgery you have to stay off it for like 6 weeks or it won’t heal….based on where the tear is.

Maybe you can just grind through it but that’s what the doc told us.

quote:

---

t won’t repair in its own

---

Read this over, and over OP. Like much connective tissue (my labrum) it doesn't heal itself, it just sits forever ripped, until it's fixed. You can take shot after shot, (in my case 18 months) and it's "fake fixed." And then it's not. Just get it scoped and move on with life. If you need an MRI, the worst part is the dye injection. You can spend a couple of months rehabbing it, or spend two years dancing around the issue, to either end up suffering for decades, or .... spending a couple of months rehabbing it. Rehab ain't hard, just don't be a cowboy.

You’ve completed the conservative measures and now it’s time for surgical.

I learned there are 3 reasons to consider surgery in a meniscal tear and they are pain that doesn’t respond to conservative treatment, prolonged swelling, and mechanical symptoms such as the knee locking or can’t fully extend it.

The surgery is very easy. You could have some earlier arthritis but I wouldn’t let that deter you from the surgery. You’ll be back to normal in a few months post therapy.

I had a severe meniscus tear in 2021, tons of pain and could barely walk.

Thanks to COVID, I had to wait about 6wks before getting an MRI so I had plenty of atrophy while I worried about my whole knee falling apart.

After the surgery consult, I chose to try rehabbing on my own. Logic: Surgery was $5K, recovery was going to be tough, and many patients report pain coming back later in life. If the rehab w/o surgery failed, I could always go back and have the surgery later.

I started Knees Over Toes Zero and progressed from there. Could barely do the movements at first, but now my knee is stronger than ever. Backward sled drags are magic. Zero regrets about not getting the surgery.

I lift, run, hike, you name it without pain.

Already seeing doc at BROC, will reach out and get update on what to do.

Someone else suggested knees over toes YouTube channel too......I saw lotta videos on there, can you suggest a good starting point video and progressive next videos please?

I’d sign up for his ATG program “Zero” which is really introductory. Once you know it well, cancel subscription and keep going.

Had surgery on mine almost exactly two years ago now. I was overweight and recovery took a bit longer because of that. Dropped about 50 pounds now and back to running. My knee only really bothers me when I am sitting at my desk for a while and then get up. After about 20 yards of walking its back to normal. It will never be 100%, but outside of going skiing or playing basketball I can do what I want. Im 41 for reference and was told regardless if I ran again or not Ill probably need knee replacement surgery in my mid 50's due to arthritis in both knees.

Depends on the injury. Cleaning the joint and trimming it with a scope is a breeze. And will only have you limited for a week or two but you can walk like 2-3 days after. A repair is a bit more complicated and will have you on crutches for about a month but will have a better chance of preserving the joint and preventing arthritis. I had a pretty significant tear of my medial meniscus with a full thickness chondral defect about the size of a nickel on the medial femoral condyle. Resulted in an open OATS procedure but ended up with complete collapse of the medial compartment of my knee with bone spurs forming. After another scope to clean up the joint but ended up with a tibial osteotomy eventually last June. Knee feels pretty good now and only real discomfort is full extension after sitting or driving for a long time. Pulling more weight on the sled than I was before all of this and pushing more weight with leg workouts. I was hurting for a while before finally getting it looked at after it started to catching and changing my gait. Very large joint effusion (fluid) was making things very uncomfortable and I decided it was time. Osteotomy wasn’t too bad minus crutches for 6 weeks. Got some nice hardware in there now hoping it keeps that integrity of the osteotomy for 20 years or so.

I often do feel the cartilage cracking in my knee and do have pain in bending knee, otherwise not much an issue. Maybe am in same boat as you. Doc was also not too keen (though he kept that option open) on doing surgery