Hey El Paso, this is Dr. David Middaugh of El Paso Manual Physical Therapy, and I’m here to talk to you guys about knee arthritis.

This affects so many people in El Paso, thousands.

Probably hundreds of thousands. ’cause I’m sure there’s lots of people out there that have never seen a doctor about it or done X-Rays or any sort of testing, and they might have some on the inside.

But I just finished talking to a client that has some knee problems and had some concern about having knee arthritis, because he’s older.

And here’s the truth about knee arthritis. It happens as we age.

Really, arthritis all over the body, in the neck, in the back, in the hips, in the knees.

What we’re finding in the research is that it’s part of getting older.

And it’s okay most of the time it’s not really causing a problem.

It’s almost like getting gray hair, or wrinkles. It’s just part of the aging process.

And I just wanted to give you an analogy, a way to think about it that would make sense.

If you think of a car, and let’s say it’s an older car … maybe a truck … if you were to slide under the truck, and take a look at the bottom of the truck, all the parts that are down there, and you find some rust … if the truck is 15-20, maybe 30 years old, that’s expected, and it’s not a problem if the truck still runs just fine, and the rust isn’t really bad.

It’s just expected because it’s an older vehicle.

Now, when it is a problem, if the rust is so bad that it’s causing holes in the metal, maybe there’s some bolts or screws that are broken because they’re rusted, and parts are starting to fall off, and the truck is no longer being held together the way that it should, then you got a problem, that rust is out of control.

Same thing with arthritis.

Inside our knee joints, if you took a picture of the inside, like using an X-Ray or an MRI machine, you might find some arthritic type changes.

Or another word they use is degenerative changes, degenerative joint disease.

If you have some of those findings on your X-Ray MRI, it’s just a sign that you’re older, and you have some rust on the inside of your joints.

And as long as it’s not really bad, it’s not severe … ’cause usually they’ll tell you on an MRI or an X-Ray it’s mild, or moderate or severe … if it’s mild or moderate, it’s probably okay, and it may not really be the reason that you have some knee pain.

So in the case of this gentleman that was here this morning, he likely has some arthritic changes, he’s in his 60s, had some knee pain, but didn’t really have any pain up until six weeks ago.

He didn’t all of a sudden get older, he got older as time went on, of course, like we all do, but what I found in his knee, is actually he had some changes in the position of his knee, and it was pinching some tissues and stretching some other tissues.

And because we know that that’s the cause of the problem, his rust, his arthritis isn’t out of control, that he can get better, and he doesn’t have to live like this the rest of his life, and he probably will never need a surgery, at least not right now he won’t need a surgery.

He’ll be able to get some hands on treatment to that knee, do some exercises, and he’ll be back to life as usual. He’ll be back to playing with his grandkids, back to traveling, back to walking around the house, doing chores around the house as much as he likes, without worrying about that knee being a problem, because he’s older and has a little bit of arthritis, probably.

So guys, if you suspect that you have arthritis, if you’ve had an X-Ray or MRI that shows that you have some arthritis, please don’t freak out about it.

Now, if you’ve got knee pain, and you’ve got arthritis, there’s a chance that it could be related, but it’s still a small chance.

What I would recommend is get checked out by an expert knee physical therapist to make sure that the arthritis is contributing to the problem, or it’s not … because if it’s not, which is usually the case, it can usually be helped and fixed, so that you can get back to life as usual, get back to walking, running, exercising, doing the chores around the house, playing with family, whatever it is that you love to do, so that that knee isn’t stopping you from living your life the way you want to.

So guys, I hope this information helps.

Remember arthritis is like rust, it may or may not be a problem … most of the time it’s not, but I hope that you can take this information and use this to look at your knee and see if it’s something you need help for.

Have a wonderful day.