Dislocated Knee Injury
July 9, 2006 by Heather R.
Filed under Women's Health
Well, here’s something that has put a snag in my efforts to lose weight and get in healthier shape. I dislocated my left knee yesterday.
I had taken my kids to the playground behind my parents’ church. For the first time in months, I had tons of energy because I’d worked out in the morning and was drinking lots of water. But when I put my 3-year-old on this tricycle merry-go-round thing, the handlebar jabbed my left kneecap, knocking it to the side.
It shocked me how much it hurt, and I crumpled to the ground. My older daughter ran to get my purse that had my cell phone in it. Within a few minutes, my mom, dad, and brother were there — and my husband was on his way.
They realized the pain was too intense for them to carry me up the hill to get to the hospital, so they called an ambulance. So, I was lying on this playground for about 30 minutes, about to pass out from the pain and 90+ degree heat. When the EMTs arrived, they had to give me morphine in order to get me moved on to the stretcher. I finally resorted to using breathing techniques I’d used during labor, but I told them this knee injury hurt worse than anything I’ve ever been through.
OK — so this was my first experience riding in an ambulance. It’s certainly not something that was on my agenda for the day. The EMTs kept ice on my knee and kept it as still as possible while they transported me. It was extremely painful again when they moved me from the stretcher to the hospital bed. In fact, one of the hospital staff whispered in my ear, “M’am, this is going to hurt like hell, but it will be quick.” That seemed to help!
Well, I’m home now, with a knee brace and crutches. The x-rays came out good, showing that I wouldn’t need surgery, and a doctor manually rotated my knee cap back into place. Next week, I’ll go to an orthopedic surgeon and probably start some physical therapy.
I feel so discouraged right now, mad at myself, even though this was an accident and couldn’t have been prevented. I’m trying to think positive — and wonder if my experience might be able to help someone else. Even though I won’t be able to exercise like I have been for several weeks, there are still things I CAN do for my health. I can continue to drink my water, eat small, healthy portions of food, and do upper body exercises that still allow me to keep my knee immobilized while it heals.
Of course, I’ve been reading a lot about patellar dislocation. Here are few sites I’ve found helpful:
Medline Plus Medical Encyclopedia: Knee Cap Dislocation
Penn Health Knee Cap Dislocation
Self Magazine Knee Forum (includes strengthening exercises)
I’ve got to keep myself upbeat, think lively, and see this as part of my journey of healthy living!
I dislocated my right knee cap yesterday. I don’t even know how it happened I was just standing and the knee cap popped to the side. The pain was excrutiating and it was worse if I moved it so when my mum and dad(I’m only 14) tried to move me to take me to hospital I couldn’t because of the pain so they called an ambulance and when the people got to my house they gave me laughing gas to relax my muscles and help the pain. That helped and so they moved me on to a stretcher and took me to hospital. I then had to wait for the nurse to see me and then ages until the doctor saw me and when he finally did he didn’t even know which exact bone had dislocated so he wanted to x-ray it before he could put it back. The x-ray was horrible, absolute agony when they had to move the knee to get a picture of it. Then later after waiting for the x-ray results and the doctor again he finally came and said he was getting a bone doctor to come and see if he could put my patella back,(This whole time my knee was still dislocated.) Then he said he could either just try and put my knee back or he could aneithitise me. I was already on a lot of pain killers, morphine and gas but it didn’t seem to be helping th pain and he said that if e aneithitised me I’d be in the hospital over night but I wouldn’t feel it when he put it back or I could just let him do it without the drugs and it would be excrutiating but then I could go home. So because I’d already been through so much and really wanted to go home I gritted my teeth and let him put it back without the medicine. Apparantly you could hear my screams all the way down the corridor. And because my knee had been dislocated for about 6 hours altogether it meant that putting it back was that much more painful. I’m so scared its going to happen again..
I can empathise with all – It’s happened to me too! Sucks doesn’t it!
My purpose today is to pass on some advice which my doctor and my specialist both said helped somewhat:
If your knee dislocates (to the side – not behind the knee!), put it back in straight away as swelling is quick and can cause more damage and makes it far more painful to put in. When mine happened I was in the middle of nowhere and had no phone reception and no choice but to bang it back in….. yeeouch!
All the best,
Angus
i dislocated my knee not to long ago (actually i dislocated my knee 12 times). i had patella realignment surgery to fix it. the recovery was a long process but it was worth it. i am bad to doing all my normal activities. after the surgery it took about 4 months to recover but time went fast . i did have to spends 6 weeks on cruches and that was probably the worst part. i am realy glad i did it.
I dislocated my left knee on December 17, 2008 ( yes i still remember from the horrible pain that still haunts me ) during a basketball practice. I’ll admit that I alwayz played straight up and never bent my knees to get in an athletic position so when i caught a pass, I pivoted on my left foot really hard ( I used to try too hard at basketball, but now I’m better )and I felt my knee go out of place. It totally knocked the breath outta me for a good minute. Afterwards it started to swell really bad and my leg was placed in an immobolizer brace for 3 weeks. It sucked cuz I couldn’t play ball for a while, but my injury wasn’t too critical. I returned to my sport 4 months later and am doing better than ever. Word of advice, be SUPER careful when playing sports like Volleyball, Football & especially basketball because injuries are a possibility for ANYONE. Strengthen your legs and core muscles and get your body in good condition to take on the intensity basketball brings. And also make sure that ur legs are bent when pivoting. You will take alot of pressure off ur ligaments and tissues in ur knee. Other than that, take precautions before playing sports