Rehab after knee surgery

[kgreen06]

Hi Coach,

Last week I had arthroscopic surgery on my left knee to remove a loose body (it was fairly large at around 1cm in length).

Knee is still a little swollen, but the stitches are removed and I've got full range of motion. Dr. said I should lay off it another week and then I can start to rehab it myself in the gym.

Before the surgery I got my squat up to 230x5x3.

My question is, should I start over with SS 3x5 on squat right away or is there a better workout for the first few weeks? Perhaps more sets or reps?

What about deadlift? Should I hold off on that till it's more fully healed and just stick with the squats for now?


Thanks

[Mark Rippetoe]

Where did the loose body originate?

[kgreen06]

Where did the loose body originate?

5 years ago I dislocated my patella on a boat while on vacation. The MRI at the time showed a small tear in the meniscus. I was advised at the time that they could scope the knee but if it wasn't bothering me, he didn't advise surgery.

Probably around two years ago, it started to bother me. Not too bad but over the course of the past two years it started to really interfere with my judo and SS, that is, it started to bother me more frequently and for longer periods of time and was interrupting my progress in both sports.

So, the tear in the meniscus must have torn off completely. The loose body probably got larger over time as my body tried to ward it off...

Good news is that the recent MRI showed no other damage and that was confirmed during the scope. Dr. said that I had surprising strength in the ligaments around the patella given the nature of the original injury so he is expecting a 100% recovery.

Told me I could go to a PT or rehab it myself... I'm electing to rehab it myself... Just wondering if the first few weeks I should do more reps or sets or different exercises or just go back into 3 x 5.

Thanks!

[Mark Rippetoe]

In a situation like this, I'd start with 5 x 5 using a weight that caused no major pain in the knee, and take it up 3x/week 5 pounds at a time. When this gets to be too much, back off to 3 sets, and you doing the standard linear progression. Deadlift on it now, regular program stuff, weight that causes no problems on top of all the squats.