How to protect your knees and meniscus?

The human body's meniscus plays a great role in supporting the knees. If you do not pay attention to protecting your knees, it is easy to cause meniscus injuries. People who often suffer from meniscus injuries include porters, athletes, and miners. For this high-risk group, they must pay attention to protecting their meniscus and knees in daily life. So how do you protect your knees and meniscus? Here are some tips on how to protect your knees and meniscus.

How to protect your knee and meniscus

1. Strengthening the functional training of the quadriceps, such as freehand training and weight-bearing training, can improve the stability of the knee joint. For friends who have already suffered meniscus damage, they need to be cautious when choosing weight-bearing exercises and do it within their ability.

2. Friends must concentrate when going up and down stairs, and wait until both feet are firmly on the ground before taking the second step to avoid damage to the knee joints. In addition, friends who often have to go up and down stairs in life can wear knee pads to help walking, which can make the joints more stable and relaxed.

3. In addition to paying attention to exercise posture and intensity, friends' sports protection should not be ignored. For example, wearing sports knee pads can prevent accidental injuries during exercise.

How to care for your knees

1. Increase lubrication

Before climbing, use your fingers to rub the lower edge of your knees to promote the protection of the knees by lubricating fluid;

Sit flat on the bed with your legs straight. While keeping your legs straight, lift them up with force. Repeat 100 times. Notice! You can't do it with both legs at the same time, you have to do it separately. Reasons and effects of this method:

Stretching the hamstrings and patellofemoral joints helps reduce the chance of knee injuries

2. Strengthen leg muscles

Many injuries occur when one's physical strength is low. When the thighs are tired, people will unconsciously lock the joints when walking. Locking the joints means stretching the legs straight. This can reduce the burden on the thigh muscles and temporarily relax their muscles. However, it can easily cause knee strain, knee impact injuries, ankle strain, ankle sprains, and lumbar muscle strain.

Muscle training: Developed muscles, especially the quadriceps, can relieve the pressure on the knees under certain circumstances and minimize knee injuries. Do more leg muscle exercises in daily life to reduce the pressure on the knees as much as possible. Consciously strengthen the training of the quadriceps (front thigh) and cruciate ligaments, enhance the strength of the inner quadriceps and thigh muscles (for example, weighted squats), and combine muscle stretching, walking, horse stance or wall exercises to pave the way for the smooth movement of the patella in the femoral end groove. However, the degree of bending should not exceed 90 degrees, and should be guided by a fitness trainer.

Here are seven types of exercise that have a healing effect:

① Weighted heel raises (standing on tiptoes) mainly train the soleus muscle of the calf. When the heels are raised and lowered, the thigh muscles are tightened. It also trains the thigh muscles, stretching and lengthening them.

② Lie on your back in bed with your legs straight and lift them up about 30 degrees. Hold for 10 seconds. Each 10-20 times counts as a set. Train until your muscles feel sore. You can also tie sandbags of appropriate weight to your calves to do straight leg raises.

③Standing practice: holding a ball or a tree stump, with knees slightly bent, like standing but not standing, buttocks slightly sunken, like sitting but not sitting, half an hour every day; horse stance, bend knees and hip joints, but not less than 90 degrees, half squat, hold for 3-5 minutes, 2-3 times as a set, twice a day.

④ Joint range of motion exercises: Since osteoarthritis often causes significant flexion limitation, flexion training is very important. Lie on your back, straighten one lower limb, bend the knee and hip of the other side to bring the thigh as close to the chest wall as possible, and then alternately exercise the other lower limb. You can also use your hands to help flex your knee and hip joints to increase the range of motion of the joints.

⑤ Swimming and walking are the best exercises. They do not increase the load-bearing capacity of the knee joint, but also allow the muscles and ligaments around the knee joint to be exercised. Exercise in water: Water has buoyancy, which can reduce the load of body weight on joints. At the same time, water has resistance, which is beneficial to muscle training. Water walking training and swimming are recommended. Swimming is also an excellent aerobic exercise that can enhance physical fitness. Slow walking: Slow walking is a simple and practical form of exercise, which is beneficial to the metabolism of cartilage and prevents muscle disuse atrophy.

⑥ Sit-ups, push-ups, bridge-like arches, repeated exercises of raising and lowering the legs while lying on the supine bed, and imitating riding a bicycle are all good exercises for patients.

⑦Isotonic and isokinetic muscle strength training: Go to the hospital or rehabilitation center and use special equipment to perform isotonic resistance muscle strength training on the corresponding muscles. When conditions permit, you can perform isokinetic muscle strength exercises, which can help restore muscle strength better and faster.

Targeted muscle training does help, but it is just "help".

3. Reduce wear and tear on the knees. Sometimes you can't help but damage your knees when you go out for fun, but it would be a shame to damage them when you exercise; do some exercises to help protect your knees, some of which are to develop muscle strength and symmetry, and some of which are certain stretching exercises.

When the leg is bent, the soft tissue inside the knee is in close contact and the lubricating fluid cannot protect the knee well. Long-term mountain climbing with weight will cause hard friction inside the knees, leading to aging of soft tissue. All prolonged movements with the knees bent will cause soft tissue degradation.

① Losing weight and reducing body weight are the first priority for obese people to protect their knees. Excessive weight hurts the knees all the time.

② Pay attention to your walking and working posture. Do not twist your body when walking or working, and do not touch the ground with only one side of one foot. Weight-bearing knee flexion and extension activities should be avoided as much as possible. Acute and chronic soft tissue injuries of the knee joint should be avoided, especially when lifting heavy objects. People who work in a semi-squatting position or often bend over and stand up to carry heavy loads should be careful not to work continuously for too long. Avoid squatting for long periods of time, because the load on the knee joint when squatting is 3 to 6 times of one's own body weight. When squatting at work (such as auto mechanics, foundry workers), it is best to change to a low sitting position (sitting on a small bench). When sitting or standing for a long time, you should also change your posture frequently to prevent the knee joint from being fixed in one posture and exerting too much force.

Walking tips

It can be found that the mountain people in various regions walk like they are flying on the grass. In fact, it can be found that when they walk, their feet are flat on the ground and they slide, their feet are not lifted high, and their knees are not bent much. They rely on their thighs and the forward leaning of their bodies. In this way, when the center of gravity moves quickly, a smooth and brisk movement is guaranteed, and the vibration is very small.

③ Wear thick-soled, elastic soft-soled shoes to reduce the impact on the knee joints and avoid wear and tear on the knee joints. Women should choose comfortable flat shoes, as wearing high heels will put more pressure on the knee joints. Those who choose to jog must choose a good pair of running shoes. Those who do high-intensity training should change a pair of shoes every 2-3 months, and those who do moderate-intensity training should change a pair of shoes every six months.

④Warm up before each training. Walking for 15 minutes and stretching are both good ways to warm up. When doing leg stretching, do not lift your legs too high suddenly to avoid excessive strain on the knee joints. When practicing Tai Chi, do not squat too low and do not do several sets in a row to avoid excessive strain on the knee joints and possible injuries.

⑤ Cycling rarely injures the knees, but racing and mountain biking can increase the risk of injury. When riding a bicycle, you should adjust the height of the seat so that you can sit on the seat with your feet on the pedals and your legs straight or slightly bent. If the seat is too high or too low, or if you pedal hard when riding uphill, it will have an adverse effect on the knee joints.

⑥ When the knee joint is exposed to cold, blood vessels contract and blood circulation deteriorates, which often aggravates the pain. Therefore, you should pay attention to keeping warm in cold weather and wear knee pads when necessary to prevent the knee joint from getting cold, especially in summer, don't be too greedy for coolness.

⑦ Soft soil, gravel slopes, and snow are all very friendly to the knees; avoid running on hard surfaces such as concrete, and the treadmill should be adjusted to have some slope. When your foot lands on the ground, your heel should touch the ground first, followed by the sole and toes. Let the entire foot roll smoothly across the ground and avoid jumping. People with knee osteoarthritis should try to avoid going up and down stairs, climbing mountains, standing for long periods of time, and lifting heavy objects as much as possible to avoid excessive load on the knee joints and aggravating the condition.

⑧Crutches, knee pads, trekking poles and braces also have certain therapeutic effects on arthritis. It is best to use two trekking poles, one with vibration dampening and one without. Without vibration protection, it can be used as a backpack support.

The vibration-absorbing trekking poles are used as the main cushioning support when going down the mountain. The impact of going down the mountain is very accumulated, including the ankles, knees, and lumbar spine, so I am used to extending the poles and using them to support the road ahead when going down the mountain. It is like walking on four legs, with both hands extended to become two legs. The key is to use the strength in place, so that the vibration force can be shared by the wrists and arms, reducing the impact on the lower limbs. Therefore, trekking poles with vibration-absorbing poles can also reduce fatigue of the wrists and arms.