Looking after your knees over the coming months

We all desire to achieve new fitness goals. Running has become very popular as more and more people return to enjoy the great outdoors.

Running has once again seen a surge in participants and really is an accessible activity.  A new pair of running shoes and some basic kit is not very expensive and enables both young and old to easily consider the “couch to 5k” as an achievable goal. However, running is often associated with knee problems.  Certainly, those people who already have advanced “wear & tear” changes within their joints will have already been advised not to run by their GP or specialist surgeon, and this advice holds true. For those of us with good joints however, running can, in fact, increase the ability of the cartilage surfaces to withstand increasing loads and therefore less susceptible to developing long term damage.

So, how does one maximise the benefits of running whilst at the same time avoiding injury?  Most “injuries” suffered by runners are in fact overuse injuries and relate to the tendons which connect the various muscles to the bones of the knee joint.  For example, “Runners knee”, which is an inflammation of the thick band of stabilising tissue on the outside of the knee joint.  This and patella tendon inflammation are the two most common problems suffered by runners. There are less common problems that may also affect the internal structures of the joint - but these are rare.