Word: knee
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...themselves differently between the sexes. Boys suffer concussions more often than girls do, no doubt because boys play more contact sports. But researchers are only beginning to understand why girls are more likely to tear their anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), a piece of connective tissue that helps hold the knee together. The difference can be dramatic. A recent study by researchers at the Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital in Manhattan determined that adolescent female athletes were eight times as likely to injure their ACL as their male counterparts...
Part of the problem, investigators believe, may be that girls usually mature more quickly than boys do, girls' knees tend to be a little looser and girls' quadriceps muscles (at the front of the thigh) are often stronger than their hamstrings (at the back of the thigh), destabilizing the knee. Many soccer coaches have learned to address the problem by spending more time drilling girls on how to land properly and encouraging them to build up their hamstrings...
...patient. Sean is half Bob's age. He weighs less, isn't as active, and has nice straight legs. Barely a trace of arthritis on X-ray and nothing except "minimal arthritic changes" on his MRI. He has taken Advil, Naprosyn, Voltaren, Celebrex with minimal help. Injections into his knees of hyaluronic acid (a component of joint fluid) and corticosteroids provided only a few weeks of relief. Physical therapy, braces, acupuncture, yoga all failed. He couldn't get out of chairs, couldn't climb stairs because of the pain. There was one thing left - a knee replacement - and it worked...
...Rotator cuff tears, herniated discs, torn knee ligaments and cartilages are just like this; the same abnormality that hurts some folks doesn't hurt others. Over 80% of asymptomatic adult volunteers (people with no pain at all) who let us do an MRI of their necks were found to have abnormalities - like disc herniations and bone spurs - that we commonly operate on in symptomatic patients. The rotator cuff, my particular expertise, is even more mysterious. When it's torn and symptomatic, there is measurable weakness. A big, symptomatic tear often makes it impossible even to raise...
...clearly have some leads; in 20 years we'll probably understand it, but today pain remains a tantalizing mystery. For now if you want to avoid that knee replacement, the best I can recommend is that you is cheer up, pop an Advil, keep working, go to the gym, eat something and buy your spouse a present...