What underpins Knee OA?

LIFETIME HIP & KNEE

Read on: danhwilliams.com

Read time: 1.5 minutes

#112: What underpins Knee OA?

So if the obvious don’t cause most Knee Osteoarthritis (OA).. what does?

What are the 'not-so-obvious' causes of MOST Knee OA?

Back in med school most cases of Knee OA were labelled as ‘primary’..

Now, for me, med school was a little while ago.. last century indeed! 😬

Digging deeper, back then, was met with a shrug.. ‘it’s primary, it just happens’. And most of us are still stuck with that messaging..

Worse than that, looking back, I just accepted it.

Didn’t question it. Didn’t think much more about it.

Our (and my!) understanding has got much better over the last 30 years.

Or rather, our imaging and measurement has dramatically improved.

That's given us a better grasp of the..

Detailed anatomy
(the shape of our bones, the pull of our muscles)
The biomechanics..
(the forces thru' those bones when we move about)

..that is, the main factors that lead to..

Inflammation, and
Cartilage damage.

John's LEFT Knee

Let's take a look at John's x-ray film..

This is the central image of long leg X-ray film taken from pelvis to foot.

The blue line runs along the RIGHT leg from the:

Centre of the hip to
Centre of ankle, through..
Centre of John's right knee.

When John steps on that leg the force runs through the..

Centre of John's RIGHT knee.

John's Bodyweight

Centre Rt Knee

3 million steps / year

No Osteoarthritis

However..

John didn't come to see me with his RIGHT knee.

John had pain on the outside of his LEFT knee.

And here's what we see when we drop a blue line from John's

LEFT hip to LEFT ankle

Long leg alignment X-ray film lateral OA knee

The outside of John's left knee is slightly under-developed.

THIS is the root cause of John's knee osteoarthrtisi (OA).

The way John was made..

John is slightly 'knock-kneed' on the LEFT side.

That blue line of force impacts not through the centre of his LEFT Knee, BUT through the outside or lateral side of the LEFT knee.

John's Bodyweight

Lateral Knee

3 million steps / year

LATERAL Osteoarthritis

That EXTRA force across a lifetime leads to cartilage damage.

And as that cartilage thins, the gap between the bones on the outside of the knee gets less. AND that increases the deformity still further.

And that leads to higher force and more inflammation.

The problem accelerates...

Osteoarthritis, once it starts, can be self-perpetuating.

Next week 🙏

The most common driver of knee osteoarthritis.

I then want to loo at the flip side to explain why some people can run well into their 80s with no Knee OA.

That can point us towards what to do about our knee pain..

Stories to inspire us and show us the way 😃

Hip + Knee Pain TOOLKITs 🛠️

Understand your Hip +/or Knee pain at a deeper level
Proven actions to do more with less pain in 3 months.

Click the pic for lifetime access (£39 /$53)

Invite a friend.. ❤️

Lovely message this week from a patient who had forwarded this LIFETIME HIP & KNEE Newsletter to someone struggling with knee pain. At this point it's motivated them to move more. Here's hoping they go on to see the benefit..
Catch up with all past Newsletter on this link 😃

Subscribe here :)

You received this email because you subscribed to our list. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Duchy Hospital
Truro
TR1 3UP
United Kingdom