Saturday, March 9, 2013

Crunching Sound in Knees - Osteoarthritis - What Can Be Done About It?


Do you suffer from crunching knees?

Even as a child you will be used to hearing the sound of knees crunching when the class knelt down at school but that probably didn't concern you at the time.

Fifteen years on if it was your knees that were crunching back then, then they may be giving you cause for concern as that sound maybe getting a little sickening to hear.

It may even be getting in the way of everyday life where you find yourself walking up stairs a funny way so to avoid any embarrassing looks.

Knee Crunching Cause

The cause is in the cartilage. That gooey liquid which helps keep the joints nice and lubricated much like oil on a chain.

When it starts to dry out the joint becomes inflamed hence the grinding sound and this is normally the sign of that osteoarthritis is kicking in.

The cause can range from a bad diet through the years, to obesity or it runs in the family, but it's more influenced by your lifestyle as a youngster.

One drawback to exercise which involves using the legs through hard impact sports on the joints like running, football, tennis etc, is that the knees may come to pay the price in the future.

Crunching Knee Treatment

NSAID's will help keep the inflammation of the joint down and reduce that crunching sound.

Even when they're not swollen, doctors suggest you take some form of prescription each day so it stays in your blood stream, so when inflammation occurs, you won't need to get your body accustomed to the NSAID again - meaning it will act straight away.

Ibuprofen is popular for people with this grinding knee condition, but these are only short term pain relief supplements and in no way help the disease go into remission.

In fact NSAID's simply cover up the real problem which is that the disease is still slowly eating away at the depleting knee cartilage, so if you want to treat the cause you need to take more control.

Arthroscopic surgery used to clean out the knee joint and smooth the cartilage was often thought of as a way of slowing down the disease, but this has now been proved false - it simply lessens the pain.

How to Treat a Crunching Knee

1. Take magnesium supplements: These have been proven far more effective than calcium supplements and have been medically proven through a 9 month clinical trial carried out in the U.S by the Journal Medicine in 2009, to improve bone density by some 11%.

2. Do low impact sports: These help rebuild the muscle tissue around the knee while improving functionality to the joint. The pain will subside and your legs will be stronger and more capable of supporting your upper body with more assurance.

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