What to Expect at Physical Therapy for Knee Pain?

If you’re suffering from knee pain, you must contact a knee pain doctor to explore your treatment options. Knee pain can be acute or chronic, and its symptoms can be mild or extremely painful and debilitating. The true root cause of knee pain determines the severity of the symptoms. But whatever the situation might be, you must contact an interventional pain specialist to explore your knee pain treatment options.

Our interventional pain doctors perform thorough assessments and recommend conservative treatments for knee pain, such as physical therapy for knee pain. We only recommend minimally invasive knee pain treatments if physical therapy and all other conservative solutions fail. If you have knee pain or knee injuries, please schedule an appointment with our knee pain doctors in New York City today.

Physical therapy is one of the most effective solutions for people with knee pain. It allows you to restore your strength and embark upon the road to recovery. Knee rehab exercises can strengthen your muscles, alleviate muscle and joint pain, and improve your range of motion. You must work with a talented and reliable physical therapist to help your body move better.

Your knee pain treatment will start with a physical therapy assessment. The interventional pain doctor will examine your knees, perform physical examinations, test your range of motion, and administer imaging tests, such as ultrasounds, CT scans, and MRI scans. These diagnostic tests will reveal the true condition of your knees, which, in turn, will help them recommend the ideal knee pain exercises.

During your first physical therapy appointment, you will work with a reliable physical therapist to curate a personalized treatment plan. Your physical therapist will discuss techniques to restore your knee’s strength and range of motion. The physical therapist will also examine your knees to determine how well they bend, straighten, and move. The knee pain doctor can only curate a physical therapy plan based on your specific condition.

The goal of the first physical therapy appointment is to determine if you have difficulty balancing, if you experience knee pain, whether it hurts when you move your lower legs if you can stand on one leg, and if you have weak muscles on the front and back of your thighs. You might be asked to hop on one leg or walk on a treadmill, which will help the physical therapist determine the true condition of your knees.

After identifying the weak spots and problem areas in your knees, the physical therapist will recommend walkers, special shoes, or crutches to help you walk during the recovery process.

Strength training is an essential component of knee pain exercises. Your physical therapist will recommend hamstring curls, single-leg dips, step-ups, wall squats, balancing exercises, and other exercises to improve your muscle strength and knee joint mobility. You will start with a few simple knee pain exercises and gradually increase the duration and intensity as you become stronger.

If you experience any pain or discomfort, please inform your physical therapist immediately. It’s normal to experience a little discomfort, but you shouldn’t push yourself if you experience knee pain. You may also experience some soreness after your knee pain exercises, so set some time for relaxation. In some cases, the physical therapist may use transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) to improve muscle strength.

Your interventional pain doctor will inform you how often you need physical therapy for knee pain. You may need to go for your knee pain exercises a few times a week for 6 weeks or more. The total duration of your physical therapy depends on the severity of knee pain and knee injuries and your progress. Your knee pain doctor will keep in touch through every stage of your recovery process.

Your knee pain doctor will curate a personalized treatment plan and physical therapy plan based on your specific condition and goals. The knee joint is a complex mechanism with numerous components, including muscles, ligaments, cartilage, and more. The knee rehab exercises will depend on your specific symptoms and goals. If you don’t engage in the correct exercises using the correct postures, you may suffer further knee pain.

You should only engage in knee pain exercises recommended by your physical therapist. However, the following are a few common knee pain exercises for different purposes:

• Straight leg raises support the knee and improve quadricep strength
• The bridge improves your hamstrings and gluteal strength
• Prone straight leg raises improve your gluteal strength and range of motion
• Wall squats improve your quadriceps strength and increase range of motion

Physical therapy and RICE (rest, ice, compression, elevation) are the first treatments for knee injuries and knee pain. But if you don’t experience sufficient knee pain relief, your interventional pain doctor may proceed with minimally invasive pain treatments, such as epidural injections, facet blocks, nerve blocks, and others. These procedures use minimally invasive techniques to address the root cause of your knee pain, thereby improving your overall knee mobility.

Please schedule an appointment if you’re experiencing knee pain in New York.