Heat (Circulation Boost) should be used when you suffer from a chronic, tight or stiff meniscus injury and after you reduce swelling, pain and inflammation with cold.
Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medications such as ibuprofen and naproxen can help to reduce inflammation and pain caused by a meniscus tear. Acetaminophen can also help to manage pain but does not reduce inflammation.
Massage – Encompassing a variety of techniques with sufficient pressure through the superficial tissue to reach the deep lying structures. It is used to increase blood flow, decrease swelling, reduce muscle spasm and promote normal tissue repair.
Rest. Avoid activities that aggravate your knee pain, especially any activity that causes you to twist, rotate or pivot your knee. If your pain is severe, using crutches can take pressure off your knee and promote healing.
Heat Therapy for Knee Injuries
Heat therapy is a common and effective way to treat many knee injuries. The heat helps relax and loosen up muscles and increases blood flow to the area, which can promote healing. It can also help to reduce pain and inflammation.
Do not use heat on an acute injury. It will draw additional blood to the injury area, increasing the inflammation and swelling. Heat instead of ice can make a injury worse and lengthen the healing time needed.
Soaking in warm water or applying a heated compress is one of the oldest, cheapest, and safest forms of complementary therapy. Research has shown that heat treatments can loosen stiff joints and relieve achy muscles.
Too much cold will keep your injury in the same state - slowing down the healing process. This can sometimes make chronic injuries linger even longer. Heat (Circulation Boost) should be used when you suffer from a chronic, tight or stiff meniscus injury and after you reduce swelling, pain and inflammation with cold.
Avoid positions and activities that place excessive pressure on knee until pain and swelling resolve. Problematic positions include squatting, pivoting, repetitive bending (eg, climbing stairs, rising from seated position, operating clutch and pedals), jogging, and swimming using the frog or whip kick.
Rest: Keep your weight off the injured knee as much as possible. Ice: Place an ice pack on your knee for about 20 minutes, several times a day. Compression: Wrap your knee with a compression bandage to help reduce swelling. Elevation: Rest with your leg raised higher than your heart to decrease swelling.
Over 4-6 weeks, the pain and swelling may decrease and activities of daily living may become tolerable. However, athletic activities may reproduce pain and swelling. Sometimes even activities of daily living such as going up and down stairs or getting in and out of cars may produce pain in a knee with a torn meniscus.
Stretch At Home To Maintain Range of Motion & Minimize Scar Tissue Build-Up. The final step in meniscus rehabilitation is stretching - this is a critical step for complete recovery from a medial meniscus tear or a lateral meniscus tear.
Spontaneous healing is uncommon in adults, but may occur in some cases. Safe strengthening activities such as cycling which avoid twisting and hyperflexion. Optional anti-inflammatory medication (Diclofenac/Voltaren or Ibuprofen/Motrin) for 1-2 weeks. Arthroscopic surgery to trim the damaged meniscus.
Not everyone with a meniscus tear will have severe pain. In fact, many of you may have no pain at all if you give your knee a few weeks to rest. If your pain persists despite a few weeks of rest or PT then we may consider repairing your tear.
The amount of pain and first appearance of swelling can give important clues about where and how bad the injury is. Tell your doctor of any recurrent swelling or of your knee repeatedly giving way. A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan is often used to diagnose meniscal injuries.
Rest: This could mean resting on the bed or walking with crutches to distribute the pressure on your knees. Resting allows the injury to heal naturally, without any surgery.
Sleep on your back with the leg slightly elevated
This is especially important during the first few days after meniscus surgery. Keeping the leg elevated (but not bent!) encourages healthy circulation, which helps keep pain and swelling in check.
Individuals with a meniscus tear often complain of pain along the joint line. They often have pain or weakness with bending the knee and sometimes they have a catching or locking sensation.
A horizontal meniscus tear is one of the easiest types of tears to repair in the knee. Rather than removing the portion of the meniscus that is damaged, the surgeon will try to sew together the circumferential fibers of the meniscus back together.
Deep Heat Patches are air activated once opened. They work by using the heat therapy method. Applying heat to the joints and muscles can help when experiencing inflammation because the heat helps relax the muscles, reduce stiffness, relieve pain and improve the blood supply to the affected area.
If you forget to use the cream apply Mentholatum Deep Heat Cream again when you remember. Do not use the cream more than 3 times in one day. More severe reactions, allergic-type such as urticaria (itchy rash), and burns at application site, may occur (frequency cannot be estimated from the available data).
Deep Heat is a hot topical treatment which generates heat in tired, injured, or sore muscles. It contains ingredients that act as counter irritants to provide a tingling, pain relieving sensation to dilate blood vessels, re-oxygenate the tissues, and relax the muscles.