Pain beneath knee

[Will]

About six weeks ago I was squatting weights around body weight, on my last set of squats I started to get a pain below my knee on my right leg. The pain was more like mild discomfort at the time so I continued with the rest of my workout.

The next day the pain in my knee felt much worse and was aggravated when walking up or down stairs, jumping, kneeling etc. Pretty much the only activity that didn't aggravate it further was walking. Therefore I began icing my knee at regular intervals and started stretching more routinely and took two weeks off until the pain abated.

The pain went away after the two weeks but a discomfort beneath my knee persisted for another four weeks. After this I decide it has been long enough and get back in the gym start with an empty bar and work up to some mild weights and perform my workout without experiencing further pain.

The next day, my knee hurts like it did before I had six weeks off. I booked a trip to the doctor, had the appointment but was not very happy with the diagnosis, as the doctor didn't really do anything apart from talk about the knee pain. I am now searching for a good sports physiotherapist. Whilst I keep looking I was hoping I could get some advice on here.

The pain is on my right leg just beneath my knee. There is a bump on the top of my shin on this leg which is not present on my left leg (or at least not as prominently). It doesn't appear to be swollen but just a solid bony lump beneath the knee. When I push it, it feels tender like a bruise would. This tenderness always seems to be present.

The real pain comes when for example squatting, it feels much weaker than my left leg which was not the case before the workout that has caused the pain. When the knee is bent under load the pain seems to run down the top part of my shin, more prominently on the inner part of the leg.

The pain also feels like it is coming from the bone rather than a muscle, but I don't know if that is retarded or not, I presume if I had damaged the bone, it would hurt a lot more than it does.

I have attached a picture of my knee and indicated where the bump is beneath it and where I feel the pain is originating from, sorry about the low quality. The black circled area is where the lump is and the blue area is where the pain seems to be when squatting.

knee.jpg

From googling I have found my symptoms are similar to that of Osgood-Schlatter Disease or Patellar tendinitis. But I am unsure still as I am 22 and do not think I am still growing, which to me makes Osgood Shlatter Disease seem unlikely.

Similarly I do not know if it is normal for these to suddenly start happening after a workout, knee pain isn't something I have experienced before, I would have thought something like Patellar tendinitis or Osgoods, would be more of a gradual progression.

I should also add that I badly sprained my right ankle two years ago, and was on crutches for around 8 weeks whilst it recovered. Since I can remember my right knee has always made a clicking sound, when it bends, it causes no pain, but it happens everytime without fail when my knee bends past a certain point. Always at the same point.

I hope this is enough information and clear enough for someone to give me some advice, until I can get to a sports physiotherapist / go back to the doctors with some more sources, so they can better diagnose the problem.

Cheers

[veryhrm]

i don't have too much insight into this, but when you actually have a deformation in addition to pain, my take is that you want to get it checked out/fixed.

The area you describe is where the patellar tendon attaches to the Tibia so it sounds like that attachment point is pissed off for some reason. Don't know what caused it or how to fix it, but other people (including Rip) have often pointed to letting the knees slide forward at the bottom as the cause of tendinitis in this area.

Also, i can report that when i lose tightness in the bottom (not enough use of the hamstrings / letting my knees come forward) i tend to get clicking in my knee, but just during the reps in question.

[farmgorgon]

I had a similar problem a few years back. My physiotherapist thought it was not patellar tendinitus per se but rather the the knee cap not tracking properly and hitting the nerve due to the mucle on the side of the leg being too strong (and the other side being too weak) to keep it in the correct place.

Anyway, here's what I did:

1. Started running with barefoot trainers (like the vibram five fingers). This co-incidentally has made my back pain better and also caused my feet to shrink nearly a shoe size as they regain their correct form.

2. Foam roll the *** our of my ITB.

3. Start doing single leg pistol squats etc (or the basic versions of them!) to strengthen the muscles that are needed to keep everything in proper alignment

Good luck.