Knee Physiotherapy Sutherland Shire
The knee is a hinge joint – yep think of it like the hinge of a door. With a simple purpose: to bend (flex) or straighten (extend)! While this explanation is simple, there are a lot of structures, including bones, ligaments, cartilage, muscles and more that make up this joint! All of these structures have a role in allowing the knee to function optimally, so we can walk , run , kick and dance!
Almost 20% of people experience knee pain in their life-time and this proportion increases with age! But knee pain isn’t isolated to just our senior athletes… with a recent study showing that 1 in 4 athletes suffer from pain in the front of the knee, with 70% being between the ages of 16-24 !
Following a knee injury, people will often notice “weakness” in the muscles around their knee, in particular in their quads! Arthrogenic muscle inhibition (AMI) is a response from your body to prevent full activation of the muscles in an injured area…
Research has found that swelling is a big factor in AMI, even without pain or damage to the knee. As little as, 10mL of swelling can reduce muscle activation and 20-60mL can reduce quadriceps activation by 40%!
Now you can see why your physio is so focused on reducing swelling in your knee!
Contact Fit and Flow physiotherapy today or read more about our knee and general musculoskeletal physiotherapy.
