McHenry Chiropractic Exercise Ideas for Knee Osteoarthritis Management
Scores of people have knee osteoarthritis in one knee or both. That doesn’t make it any easier on its sufferers though. OrthoIllinois Chiropractic has some novel exercise tips and treatments our McHenry knee osteoarthritis (KOA) patients will want to attempt.
KNEE OSTEOARTHRITIS (KOA): What It Is and How Common It Is
Knee osteoarthritis is aging-related and oh so common! 86 million people globally over 20 years old were diagnosed with it in 2020. Characteristically, knee osteoarthritis sufferers feel a loss of knee extensor strength, a greater severity of knee pain, and a decline in functional performance. (1) Knee osteoarthritis is the degeneration of cartilage, part of the natural aging process whether we like it or not. Physical activity has been shown to positively affect cartilage structure despite not yet knowing which exercise is best. (2) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic sees new treatment ideas being published a lot.
KOA TREATMENT: Your McHenry chiropractor has it.
A chiropractic treatment approach has shown potential. A trial of Cox® flexion distraction decompression principled treatment for knee osteoarthritis – namely distraction of the knee – reported relief of patient-perceived pain from 7.7 (out of 10) to 1.8 in a mean of 5.3 visits in 3 weeks for 25 patients. (3) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic can link this treatment (and even some cartilage-supporting nutrition!) with your home-exercise for relief.
KOA TREATMENT: YOU, our McHenry knee pain patient
Even though the benefits of exercise abound for KOA is well known, KOA sufferers are not known to stick to the exercise practice. One study set up an easy-to-follow video set and automated recording calendar of when they did each video that showed an 82.4% participation rate. Not bad! The patients also described satisfaction, pain reduction, and better physical function. (4) One month-long intervention of unilateral, non-KOA knee extensor strength training produced significant improvement in the knee extensor strength of the knee with KOA! This is called “cross education phenomenon.” The better extensor strength and neuromuscular function of the knee with KOA maintained itself for 3 months. (1) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic knows a KOA sufferer won’t care which knee is exercised as long as relief is forthcoming! A proposed YOGA (YOGa and strengthening exercise for knee osteoArthritis) study was recently described to see how yoga’s mind-body exercise format - known to enhance flexibility, muscle strength, balance and fitness - might decrease the symptoms of knee osteoarthritis and even enhance other outcomes like pain, function, quality of life, gait speed, cost effectiveness, and others. (5) Another study studied how blood flow restriction with low and high load resistance exercise of the KOA-affected knee impacted various blood tests in female patients with unilateral KOA and discovered that markers for skeletal muscle tissues were increased. (6) All these studies on various approaches to handle knee osteoarthritis may hopefully find a way to ease/prevent/better manage this common condition.
CONTACT OrthoIllinois Chiropractic
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. Luigi Albano on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he illustrates beneficial chiropractic knee treatment via The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management for patients with KOA.
Make your McHenry chiropractic appointment soon. Are you ready for some knee pain relief? Come see us!
