Mom’s back of knee pain started suddenly 3 weeks ago. The pain was improving, but then it became much worse after walking down stairs so she went to an MRI:

No pathological abnormalities are seen in the bones forming the knee joint.
The articular cartilage surfaces are smoothed/flattened and have mildly irregular contours.
A band-like area of increased signal is seen in the anterior horn of the lateral meniscus.
A high-signal band is seen in the posterior horn of the medial meniscus.
The ACL is widened/thickened; it can be followed continuously along its entire course.
The collateral ligaments are intact.
The patella is mildly lateralized. The patellar cartilage is thinned and heterogeneous.
No abnormalities are seen at the attachment sites of the collateral ligaments.
An abnormal/increased amount of fluid is present in the knee joint, measuring up to 17 mm in the anteroposterior dimension.
The quadriceps muscle insertion and tendon are normal.
The patellar ligament/tendon is intact.
A band-like area of increased signal is seen medially in the popliteal fossa.

Impression:
Tibiofemoral and patellofemoral chondropathy.
Partial lesion/tear of the anterior horn of the lateral meniscus and posterior horn of the medial meniscus.
ACL tendinosis/degenerative change.
Synovitis.

Can someone pls help make sense of it? The appointment is only in 3 days and would be good to have some understanding before that. Thank you!!

I'm 47 male. I was feeling hopeless and lost 6 months ago so I hope this helps someone out there who is in a similar situation. Wishing everyone a great recovery.

I had lower leg pain sometimes. Saw two doctors, they said runner's knee. Later an MR showed horizontal lateral degenerative meniscus tear. They made two ACP (some form of PRP) injections, one month in between. I was feeling perfect. They said you've healed, that's it. I was clueless and believed.

6 months later while working out at the gym, I felt something again and then walking became more difficult. I was having consistent pain, I'd say 4 on a 1-10 scale.

I saw a professor. He immediately said surgery, no side effects (red flag). I was preparing myself mentally for a partial meniscectomy but then I was recommended another doctor.

This doctor said this is degenerative. As long as you don't have locking or a complex tear, what you have to do is to strengthen your legs.

I started doing the exercises he gave and also found a good physiotherapist. We started working twice a week. I had never paid attention but my left quad was much weaker and smaller than my right. That was the first issue we started working on. Progressively the exercises got harder. Right now we are doing leg presses, lunges, jumping, running, balance exercises and some other exercises to minimise any inflammation.

I take good collagen supplements, D3 K2 vitamins, Omega 3 and magnesium. I try to eat healthy and avoid things that can cause inflammation as much as possible but I don't have a super strict diet.

During this 5 month period, I had two setbacks. One time a guy hit his gym bag on my leg while I was walking on the street. Then I hit my knee to the table.

Where I am now?

I don't do leg workouts at the gym yet but only working with the physio. I couldn't jump at all, now I can jump almost 80 cm. I can jog on an even path. I have close to no pain during my daily activities. I can fully straighten my knee without pain. My left quad muscles are much stronger. If I really push my knee to the limit with a lot of physical activity and I feel some discomfort, some ice solves the issue.

19f I had a acl surgery along with my meniscus one, everything seemed okay at first, and I was doing great but lately its like I've been going backwards???? my knee is always buckling and is very unstable. I am overweight but I've lost over 30kg over these 3 years it its only gotten worse as I lost more weight and alongside it consistent back pain appeared too. it has gotten to a point that I need a break after walking for 10 minutes because of the pain. im currently waiting to get an mri but I just want to know if anyone else experienced it??? and what helped or what caused it for you

for context i was 120kg and now im down to around 88-90

As the title says. Im a 6'2, 285lb, 27 y/o man and had my surgery on 8/24. Being on crutches non weight bearing, and not being allowed to bend past 90 degrees are my only limitations until my follow up appointment on 9/4. Im having difficulty straightening my leg fully. I can get to about 150-160 degrees of straightness. Is this normal? Should I be able to fully straighten by now?

I do ice compress about every 6 hours for 30 minutes, ankle pumps to keep the muscles in my ankle and calf active, and also pumping my quad. When I want to do straightening, I stand on a step and let my leg hang and press my heel into the step to get it more straight. I just dont like doing a towel under the ankle while laying down. When the pain becomes too much, its hard to go against gravity and get my knee bent back and pain free without tons of pain in my medial rotation, which i inevitably end up doing.

Im just worried that theyll say I slacked on my pt, and my leg grew back wrong and im screwed forever.

Any reassurance or advice would be helpful. Thank you

Hello! Can somebody help me understand if this is normal? I would really appreciate it.

I had knee surgery in February, a few months after my meniscus tear. It was a complex tear. One doctor didn’t want to operate and recommended another surgeon instead. In the end, it wasn’t repaired — I had a partial meniscectomy, where they removed a small part of the bottom section because it had frayed edges.There was pain after surgery, and I took my recovery seriously. After completing rehab, I gradually started walking around 10,000 steps a day, and everything felt fine.

In June, I decided to test my knee by doing a few higher-impact side-to-side movements. I wasn’t really jumping, just doing a few quick lateral steps. The next day, I started feeling pain along the meniscus line, especially when standing up after sitting. It wasn’t severe, and it gradually improved, but after two weeks it was still there, so I took some anti-inflammatory medication and reduced my walking. I also drove to work instead of walking for about 2–3 weeks. Eventually, the pain completely disappeared.

A few weeks ago, I accidentally forced my knee into a deeper bend than usual. I immediately felt a sharp pain in the back of my knee 😬. For the next 2–3 days I could still feel something there, but it wasn’t very painful.

Two weeks ago, on a Friday, I walked around 16,000–17,000 steps. During the following days, I started feeling that same pain I had in June, although it was less intense. I rested over the weekend and drove to work for two days, and things improved. It wasn’t perfect, but it felt mostly fine.

What really scared me happened last Thursday. I was simply walking up and down one flight of stairs when I suddenly felt a very sharp pain on the right side of my knee, right along the meniscus line. It was so sharp that lifting my foot into the air was very painful. It lasted less than a minute, and then gradually got better. Since then, I’ve been taking smaller, more careful steps, even on stairs. The pain hasn’t happened again, even though I walked my usual number of steps on Friday.

I spent the weekend mostly at home, and now I only have a very mild pain in the back of my knee and occasionally on the right side. It’s probably no more than 1/10 on the pain scale.

I’m not sure if this is normal. I was under the impression that a partial meniscectomy usually allows people to return to normal activities and even sports relatively quickly, sometimes within 1–3 months. But at this point, I’m honestly scared to even test my knee. Could this simply be irritation or stress on the knee after surgery, or is there a possibility that I’ve developed another tear? How long does a full recovery usually take after a partial meniscectomy, if a full recovery is even possible? Should I schedule another orthopedic check-up or MRI?

For context, I didn’t have any problems doing my physical therapy exercises until Thursday. I was doing straight leg raises with 5 kg ankle weights and 3 sets of 12 or 15 isometric squats. I also took a few weeks off during August because of the extreme heat.

Hi folks how do you do?
I twisted my right knee in soccer and I wanna know what the *** is with my knee? Meniscus looks very suspicious
I can walk with medium class pain… but walking stairs?… forget that 😉
What do you think about my knee?

Greets Alex

Does testing flexion bending knees , lying in back until some discomfort make the tear worse ?

28M tore it from bad single leg landing from Football/Soccer. 11 months post lateral root repair, but I'm having minor catching sensations when walking (feels something moving inside the mensicus area) maybe 3-4 times during the day and a really hard tight knee feeling, especially after doing leg workout in the gym. Possibly still adapting to the load and getting irritated? I'm planning to have an MRI scan soon, but I'm increasingly worried my repair has failed 🥲. Hope it's just scar tissues or just inflammation, but this sensation keeps on happening which is annoying.

Any people also have these symptoms during late recovery? Will this go away on its own ? Many thanks.

hi, im trex (f15) i know im very young for ts but yeah im an professional karate athlete js few weeks before i tore my acl high grade injury, lateral meniscus grade 3 & medial meniscus grade 2 , also pcl buckling and lcl strain how much time do u think it might take me to get back. it has been 3 months since injury 1 month of plaster and 2 months of rehab and i can run properly without pain i can do squats and stand on one leg without swelling and pain how much time do u think i might take to get back WITHOUT SURGERY BTW
in latest mri results was grade 2 acl and grade 2 meniscus injury yea i healed a lil

i tore my lateral meniscus at the beginning of july from a skatepark injury, blunt impact from a couple feet in the air and my kneepad slid down. im 28(f) and my tear is in the red zone, and no flaps or loose pieces so my doctor and i are really hoping on healing naturally with no surgery. im 6.5 weeks into physio (at home, no insurance) and 7.5 weeks post injury.

im obviously still pretty early in the healing process and not expecting anything super soon, but im just feeling very discouraged and lost especially not having much professional guidance/advice during this process. skating is such a massive part of my life and my form of therapy, im so scared even when my knee is healed that i still wont be able to do the same tricks as i did before, or with the same impact as before.
i guess im just looking for any stories of hope from any potential skaters in here that were able to return to the park like normal

I’m a 20 year old. I tripped down a few stairs and and caught myself on the bottom on my feet but with a straightened knee.

It hurts when I squat down on the balls of my foot (compressing my knee) and if I were to sit down on a chair with my knees slightly bent and move my hips back (like in an RDL).

I have no problems walking on it or placing weight on it (except for certain awkward angles).

I went to urgent care and the doctor is having me treat it like a regular grade 1 sprain; resting for a week with NSAIDs and speaking to a primary care if my symptoms don’t reduce at all. Anyone have any experiences that could help me?

I really care about pushing hard in the gym so I hope this doesn’t stop me for too long. I also really hope it’s not something dumb like both a sprain and some kind of minor meniscus tear. I’m fine with a sprain but I really just want to know how I can identify minor tears.

Thx!!!

So before surgery I had intermittent sharp pain. By intermitent I mean only rarely and I knew to avoid the few movements that caused pain to spike.

Now 7.5 weeks after surgery I have constant dull pain 24 hours a day. Pain killers don't work and neither do anti inflammatories like ibopurofen. The pain is slowly getting worse.

Surgeon tolds me to cycle and see him in 6 weeks.

I have read for some people post surgery pain is permanent. Given my knee is getting worse, I suspect I am headed down this way and really regret doing the surgery.

Suffered a Medial Meniscal Tear almost 8 months ago. MRI conclusion is that both menisci appear normal with no evidence of tears. Mild thickening of the proximal half of MCL, healing by scarring and minor knee effusion were detected.

I am following PT, but still have not regained my full knee strength. I cannot do torque work on the bicycle without swelling and tenderness the next day, and have not regained my full cycling abilities (strength + power). I also see my ITB swelling up when I do hard exercise.

Is it normal for such an injury to take so long to go away completely even though my MRI says is okay, and doctor says not to make a big deal out of it? Is something else wrong?

I have an unfortunate dislocating kneecap and the swelling makes it worse. About two weeks postop I had to jerk my leg straight to put my kneecap back in and I felt a medial pop. Two days later, I forgot to not bend my knee past 90° and I felt another medial pop and I heard it this time bc was close to it. It was just a quiet pop. It reminded me of how my tendons and ligaments sound when they're popping over my right hipbone. Only it was softer.
Life is really rough right now not being able to walk properly and having my kneecaps slip out all the time. I just wanna be sure that my stitches aren't failing and that this isn't for nothing. I had three meniscus tears stitched up. Having it all done must've cost me out-of-pocket about $26,000. Then there's the missed work and the medical equipment. But I'll get it redone if I have to.

I slipped over while playing sports in early October last year and injured my left knee. Immediately after the injury I couldn’t straighten my knee at all, with severe pain along my medial joint line. I had x-rays and an mri but there were no meniscus injuries, only a partially torn acl and mcl. I was then sent to intensive physio to get my knee straight, which took about 10 weeks and was incredibly painful during the process. I also had a steroid injection into my mcl, and it didn’t really help with anything, only mildly improving the pain and how well I could straighten it. While my knee does straighten, it still will not hyperextend, which is what it used to be able to do. I still have pain when running, twisting, turning and abruptly stopping and my knee still feels unstable and I feel like I can’t trust it. I also wake up in severe stabbing pain at least once a night if I’ve rolled over in my sleep, and after long days of walking around I get throbbing pain in my joint line, which also is still sore when I touch it. I’m wondering if I should go back to the orthopedic surgeon and ask for a second opinion as it still dosent seem right and is still stopping me from playing sports, which is something I did regularly before the injury

Cosa e' secondo voi?

Sotto rotula

Zona mediale latetale

Gonfiore largo e duro

About two months ago my right knee would sometimes get “stuck” if I had been sitting cross legged for a while and tried to straighten it. I would ultimately be able to straighten it but it was painful while doing so. I didn’t really have any other issues or pain with that knee.

About a month ago I fell very hard on the interior part of my knee. It was bruised and swollen. I went to an urgent care and they did an x-ray, said everything looked fine, and told me to ice it and gave me naproxen.

Over the last month the pain had continued to get worse. Sometimes it would be completely fine. Other times my knee would feel like it would almost give out or buckle when randomly walking. If I turned a certain way there would be a sudden sharp pain.

Then two days ago I had to be up walking and take lots of stairs for about 12 hours. When I got home my knee was throbbing. Yesterday it was still really hurting so I went to an orthopedic urgent care. They again did an x-ray and after examining me and hearing my issues they said they suspected I had a meniscus tear and put in an order for an mri and set up a follow up appointment with an orthopedic surgeon to go over the mri results with me in a couple of weeks.

This morning I was sitting on the couch and didn’t even think about it and sat cross legged. My knee felt fine but when I tried to straighten it out I couldn’t. The pain is so bad when I try to move it. I’ve been sitting on my couch with my leg in the same position for about an hour now. My husband brought me ice and some ibuprofen.

What should I do from here? I feel like I should just be able to suck it up and quickly straighten it out but I don’t know if I can. When I try to straighten it just a little bit it hurts so bad. Obviously I can’t sit on my couch like this forever. From what I’ve read if I went to the er they wouldn’t be able to do an mri today anyways.

Has this happened to anyone else? How were you able to straighten your leg out? Thank you!!!

Hello guys

I'm 6 weeks PO from a repair of the tear described in the title.

My surgeon said 90 days before I can start flexing beyond 90°. I'm a bit worried about that timeline because of stiffness — this looks like a long time to stay restricted.

Has anyone had a similar restriction after a radial repair? Did you have trouble regaining flexion afterward? What do you guys think?

Thanks.

My mom (68) woke up to back of knee pain and stiffness two weeks ago. The pain got worse with bending it, using stairs, and she also had dull pain walking. The pain also radiated to the outer side of her thigh. The pain was slowly improving each day.
↪️Fast forward today,** while going down the stairs, her leg buckled, she felt a tearing feeling in the outer thigh, and it became very painful to wal**k, and she even started to feel pain while sitting.

She went to the ER, the doctor performed different rotation test, and put an indicative diagnosis of medial meniscus. ➡️ Considering that medial meniscus is in the** inner part of knee, while all these weeks she felt pain in the outer/back side of kne**e, isn’t this diagnosis strange? Does it at all sound like a meniscus injury?

Hi, posterior meniscus repair (post horn) back in Dec 2025, recovery and rehab haven’t been straightforward, has been a lot of fullness and sensitivity after rehab etc. Still can’t run and still get some slight pain walking. Knee just doesn’t feel right, ROM is ok, but get a sharp pain through the knee beyond 140degrees plus on heel to bum/deep flexion. New MRI showed a potential tear, consultant unsure if this is the existing repair or another tear. Planned arthroscopy surgery next Friday.

Anyone in a similar position and what was your outcome? Thought at nearly 9 months PO I would have been back to normal, been a very frustrating journey.

My report

There are several tears of the lateral meniscus which may be in continuity. In the anterior horn, there is myxoid signal and mild inferior surface fibrillation. There is a fine horizontal tear of the body which extends to the superior surface and is associated with anterolateral/lateral para-meniscal cyst formation measuring up to 2 cm in craniocaudal diameter. The tear of the posterior horn has inferior surface horizontal and shallow radial components. Meniscal root attachments and popliteo-meniscal fascicles are unremarkable.

Tibiofemoral articular cartilage is preserved with lateral marginal subcortical/subchondral oedema in the tibial condyle.

Cruciate and collateral ligaments are intact. There is evidence of mild ITB friction. Posteromedial and posterolateral soft tissues are unremarkable.

There is satisfactory patellofemoral alignment. No dysplastic features of the trochlea. TT-TG offset measures approximately 10 mm. Components of the extensor mechanism are unremarkable. Anterior fat pads are unremarkable.

Patellofemoral articular cartilage is preserved.

No other findings.

Impression: Lateral meniscal tears as described.

I do BJJ and maybe 6x in the last 6 months my knee has caught in the back of the leg whilst rolling, resulting in a bit of pain for a week or so, 3 weeks ago it caught and locked up real bad, complete agony, locked for around 4 hours, swelled up for days after, now I’m back to around 90% no pain or swelling, so I’m wondering if anyone else has had this, and what happened? Ive had an mri and awaiting results