Torn Meniscus

So the doc says I have a torn meniscus and need surgery. For any of you guys that have had this done what I am to expect?

I had the surgury done in December for mine. Still a little bit sore, but getting better every day. Immediately my knee felt better after the surgury. I waited too long to get mine done and ended up with some damage to the cartilage as well. They only go in thru 3 small incisions, so no big scars. Went in in the morning and was home that evening.

Thanks for the reply, I was hopping for a faster recovery.

I just had it done in conjunction with a full ACL reconstruction (thanks to 30+ years of skiing ending in an epic crash up at Whistler back in January) and my knee already feels better. (I'm 13 days post-op) Surgery was scope assisted, so several small scars vs one big ass scar. I did not have a bad meniscus tear, so they cleaned up the tear (debridement, in doc terms, I guess) and I have about 20% less meniscus on the interior of my knee. I can post pics of the aftermath if you want, let me know. Get the surgery done... you'll be much better off. Best of luck...

I will see the doc on Monday to see how this will be set up and get more details. Thanks for the real life experinces. So how is the pain after surgery, this will be the small 3 hole job per the surgeon.

Had mine done when I was 13. Rehab twice a week and I was good as new in a month. No way would I recover that fast today, but still wouldn't expect more than 6 months tops myself depending on how much rehab I went to.

If you are getting it done soon after your injury, you should have a lot faster recovery than me. I put off going to the doc for way too long and did extra damage.

I did mine at work (on L&I), I used sports med Dr. They had me doing physical therapy for 2 hours everyday, before and after surgery. They held off my surgery for a month, pre-op PT supposedly cuts recovery time.


Pain was minimal to non existent. I got 100% recovery, torn ACL (patella graft) & both meniscus had tears.


Biggest regret- watching online videos of surgery before surgery. Best thing I did- Got 100% extension of leg under nerve block.

I do not know when it happened, the pain just started about 10 days ago. I will see what the doc says after he gets the MRI report. He seems to think from his exam that it is torn and needs to be fixed. I was very active before this started, but it is all I can do not to just make it through the day at work.

Docs had me wait 9 weeks from injury to surgery so I could let the swelling go down and then PT my leg back up before surgery. I'm on 2hr of PT a day now (post-op) with 2x appts. a week with the PT people to monitor/modify/increase my PT regimen. I can say with certainty that PT before surgery has sped up my post-op recovery. I'm just in a waiting game until the 6 week point when I can really ramp up the PT once the ACL graft (allograft for me) is fully healed/fused.

Post-op pain wasn't terrible... I had a femoral nerve block as well (80%) for the surgery and about 48hrs after. Docs gave me enough Rx pain meds (oxy and percs) to kill just about any pain, but I took less than half the percs and none of the oxys and was never "in pain" unless I was doing PT. I got a cool machine called a GameReady that does ice and compression that was a godsend... ask for one from your doc, as they are an Rx item. (does not compute, but they are)

I concur that watching the videos online ahead of time is not a great idea. I had to make a choice for my graft (allo vs auto, basically your own tissue or cadaver) so I needed to do some research and it was a necessary evil in my case. I was hoping to get video of my actual surgery after it was done, but the digital storage system the hospital was using crapped out the day of my surgery and didn't save and video so all I got was pics from the scope. I had previously torn my meniscus, which had since healed, and I had no idea at all. I'm not surprised, given they way I've punished my knees over the years, but I'd never had knee pain or instability unitl the fall this winter.

Best of luck on a successful surgery and speedy recovery!

You arent the first person I heard say this.

http://rehabilitationstartsnow.com/2011/10/18/first-check-up-technical-stuff/

1/2 way down graph.


I went sports med, I was shown this chart before the surgery by the PT team. They claim at surgery you are 100%, then it dives to 20 or 30% at 6 weeks out, then you rebuild fromt here. They worked me like hell pre-op, then again from day three on out.

I didnt understand it then, I still dont see how it is true, but thats what hey told me.

I had two old fashioned Slocum procedures before I had a complete ACL reconstruction. The ACL reconstruction went great, and I was finally able to do all the throws in jujutsu both right and left handed. Prior to the surgery, my bad knee would wash out, but after the surgery, it is strong as can be.

The thing that helped me recover faster was doing lots of PT. I hate ice, but I would sit in a really hot bath until I got a good sweat going, then would very slowly start flexing the knee more and more. After the bath, I would ice it down really good. Even the physical therapist said that what I did speeded up my recovery by 20-30%. There is no way around time...your body simply needs time to mend. But there are some things you can do to get your flexibility back a little faster. But it takes a lot of persistence.

My docs showed me the same chart and told me the graft was 100% out of surgery ("rock solid" was the term my surgeon used) and then degraded from there as my knee "healed" from surgery. Docs said 6-9 months for 100% recovery, and probably have to use a brace next ski season just to be safe.

I didn't mean to imply I'm not PTing now... I am, and as hard as they'll let me. They won't let me start true resistive or strength training until the 6wk point is what I meant. I am working on regaining ROM (I'm up to a baseline 0 deg extension and almost 100deg flex) and keeping my leg muscles from atrophying while me knee heals. Lots of stationary bike (I can start regular biking next week) and quad sets, leg raises, static standing and weight shift exercises. I had my stitches out the beginning of this week, so I can start soaking it in a hot bath followed by ice as the last poster suggested as well. It's a long, slow (and painful) process, but I'm not going to rush to failure and undo or compromise the repair because I want to "push it". Patience has never been one of my virtues, and this is my first major injury (and surgery) ever, so this is a whole new ballgame for me.

This is not sounding as easy as I had hopped.

Godsdaddy,
You sound just like me with the PT. The therapists I saw used to tell me to NOT do so much. That was where the hot bath and flexion came in really useful. The heat prior to trying to increase my ROM made a huge difference. The recovery from my ACL reconstruction took a long time, but that knee is now stronger than my uninjured natural knee...pretty damned impressive.

I watched the video of the doc doing my ACL reconstruction. It looked alot like wood shop using parts from my knee. My first reaction was "Are you #@itting me?" The second reaction was while I felt sorta woozy thinking "Geezus, that is my flesh he is calmly snipping on and trimming like a cheap steak..., but sorta cool actually."

Its not as bad as you think either.

I was old, fat and hated needles & Dr's when the injury occurred, and I got a better than issued knee out of the deal.


Its really not that bad.

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