Struggling with Pain in the front of your knee?

In our last blog, we went over common reasons or pathology that you may have pain in the front of your knee. We have seen first hand how debilitating knee pain can be in our patients. It affects your ability to go up/down stairs, play with your kids, or do household chores. In this blog, we will give a few starting exercises that may help get a jump start on your battle with knee pain.

1.Lateral band walks:

• We like to start with this exercise to help strengthen and increase how well your glutes help to stabilize your knee while performing activities. If you feel like your knee feels “unstable” or “wobbly",” chances are it could be coming from your outside hip muscles being weak.

• Focus on not letting your knee cave in and don’t drag your foot. Perform 8-10 reps each way, complete 2-3 sets.

2. Foam Roller Wall squats:

• We really like this squat variation to reduce pressure on the front of the knee and to build tolerance to deeper ranges of motion. All you need is a foam roller or a physioball and a wall!

• Make sure you keep the tempo on these quite slow to really make the quads work hard. Complete 2-3 sets.

3. Floating Heel Split Squat Isometrics:

• We like this squat variation to work the knee and the calf at the same time.The calf is vital in helping to decrease pressure on your knee, especially with running and walking.

• Try to keep your knee slightly over toes and hold each rep for 20-30 seconds. Complete 2-3 sets on each leg

As always, if you have been dealing with knee pain, it is best to see a medical professional to develop the best possible rehabilitation plan to get you back to the activities that you love doing. The exercises provided above are very general and not medical advice. If you would like to get checked out by one of our sports perfomance doctors of physical therapy, schedule a discovery call session to see if we are a good fit for you!