The patients in the study were all between 45 and 70 years old. The patients had all been referred by general practioners to one of the participating hospitals for treatment of knee pain, van de Graaf noted. Van de Graaf and his colleagues randomly assigned 321 patients to receive either surgery or physical therapy. If the tear is big - and the patient unlucky - it can flip into a position that locks the knee into either a bent or straight position. When a meniscus is torn, it can cause pain, swelling and stiffness in the joint.
“If physical therapy doesn’t improve knee function, patients can still opt for surgery (later).”Įach of our knees has two menisci - wedge-shaped pillows of fibrous and rubbery cartilage which sit between the thighbone and the shinbone and act as shock absorbers to cushion the joint and keep it stable.
“Our results confirm the findings of previous studies and justify an initial conservative approach with physical therapy in patients older than 45 years with a non-obstructive meniscal tear,” said the study’s lead author, Victor van de Graaf, a resident in orthopedic surgery at the OLVG Hospital in Amsterdam. (Reuters Health) - For many people with a tear in the rubbery cartilage that cushions the knee, physical therapy may work just as well as surgery in terms of quieting pain and returning the joint’s function, a new study suggests.ĭutch researchers following more than 300 patients with a torn meniscus that was not severe enough to lock the knee found that joint function improved both with surgery and with physical therapy, according to the report published in JAMA.
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