Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

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Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby GeoffreyLevens » Sat Nov 18, 2017 1:36 pm

This is the most encouraging thing I have seen in awhile. Bottom line is proper diet and moderate exercise is the best treatment!

https://www.regenexx.com/orthopedic-urb ... lage-pain/

Excerpt:
Does Cartilage Loss Cause Knee Pain
"...An analysis of the Framingham study data showed that among more than 700 patients, the loss of cartilage on MRI was not associated with pain....

...The upshot? So, when your doctor glances at your knee x-ray and/or your MRI and sees lost cartilage and tells you that this is the cause of your pain, he’s relying on an urban myth, not science. Knee pain is caused by a complex interplay of things, only a handful of which can be seen on MRI and less cartilage is not one of those things."
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Re: Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby viv » Sat Nov 18, 2017 1:51 pm

Thanks for enlightening me! I have always wondered about this. When I was heavy I bad knee pain and was told by the doc that I had osteoarthritis in the knees and the "cartilage was being worn down" or something similar. Basically she was giving me "you're getting older and this is to be expected" speech. So although I was thrilled, I couldn't fathom how all pain in my knees left after only one week on the McDougall Diet. Because my worn down cartilage was still worn down right?

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Re: Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby Willijan » Sat Nov 18, 2017 6:59 pm

viv wrote:Thanks for enlightening me! I have always wondered about this. When I was heavy I bad knee pain and was told by the doc that I had osteoarthritis in the knees and the "cartilage was being worn down" or something similar. Basically she was giving me "you're getting older and this is to be expected" speech. So although I was thrilled, I couldn't fathom how all pain in my knees left after only one week on the McDougall Diet. Because my worn down cartilage was still worn down right?

Viv


I went to my doctor one year ago with multiple places of pain, all with different histories, different starting dates, and, in my mind, likely causes. In spite of all the information I wrote up for him, he said, "You have arthritis." Therefore, I can get no help from him with my pain, which is ongoing. I am currently trying acupuncture, but only 3 weeks in. Have done lots and lots of yoga for this too. I don't know if it is ever going away, but I do know I am seeing my doctor the absolutely fewest times possible! Useless man.
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Re: Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby Willijan » Sat Nov 18, 2017 7:15 pm

GeoffreyLevens wrote:This is the most encouraging thing I have seen in awhile. Bottom line is proper diet and moderate exercise is the best treatment!

https://www.regenexx.com/orthopedic-urb ... lage-pain/

Excerpt:
Does Cartilage Loss Cause Knee Pain
"...An analysis of the Framingham study data showed that among more than 700 patients, the loss of cartilage on MRI was not associated with pain....

...The upshot? So, when your doctor glances at your knee x-ray and/or your MRI and sees lost cartilage and tells you that this is the cause of your pain, he’s relying on an urban myth, not science. Knee pain is caused by a complex interplay of things, only a handful of which can be seen on MRI and less cartilage is not one of those things."


So diet and moderate exercise help with knee pain in general, or knee pain caused by arthritis, or. . . ? I did read the article at the link you supplied, but I didn't see the part about diet and exercise. Thanks for the post, Geoffrey!
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Re: Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby calvin » Sat Nov 18, 2017 9:23 pm

Just be aware that Centeno (sen TEN oh), the head of the Regenexxnetwork, is enamored with the low-carb paradigm of Atkins and that ilk. And Regenexx makes a line of supplements typical of paleo fans available to his patients. I am in the midst of a Regenexx prp/stem cell procedure right now; i will not, however, be following their off-target nutritional advice because I want to support a favorable outcome, not frustrate it.

Just so you know, the Regenexx low-carb take...

I'm Healthy So Sugar Won't Hurt Me, Right?

...starts out with this:

While everyone has been taught that fat is bad, this was wrong. Turns out that the fat causes heart disease thing was a myth. The real public enemy has always been sugar. Now a new study shows just how damaging sugar can be. Why Sugar Is Our Dietary Enemy Besides the obvious, which is the...
Last edited by calvin on Wed Nov 29, 2017 2:57 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby patty » Sat Nov 18, 2017 10:12 pm

Pain Relief Clinic London & Dubai
Egoscue University Certified
Member of the British Holistic Medical Association

https://www.painreliefspecialist4u.com/ ... ief-london

Knee Pain - Cartilage Grows Back //

When people hear “bone-on-bone” (knee, hip, wrist, ankle etc.) most people think “it’s too late to do anything, time for a replacement.” This line of thinking comes from the idea that our bodies are like machines. “When your cars’ brakes are worn-out you need to replace the brake pads with new ones and then your car is back to normal.” But as I said our body has an incredible power to heal itself in all aspects.

When Pete released (his book) Pain Free back in the early 90s, he made the claim that you can regrow cartilage and took a lot of criticsm for saying so. People thought he was crazy and dismissed his statement. If you don’t have a copy of Pain Free, here is what Pete Egoscue says on page 107:

“As for the ‘irreversible’ cartilage loss, why of all the tissue in the body would the cartilage be the only one that does not regenerate? The answer is that it does regenerate. Laboratory experiments in Sweden have shown that under the right conditions cartilage, like any tissue, can be grown. Moreover, sports medicine practitioners have long recognized that athletes increase their cartilage density and shock-absorbing capacity during proper training.”

In his own words from his book Pain Free for Women he says, “That statement drew a barrage of criticism from doctors, researchers, and physical therapists. When cartilage is gone, they scolded me, it’s gone, and nothing short of a miracle will bring it back.”

Well, if it’s a miracle they want, then it’s a miracle they’ll get. Thanks to Rick Mathes in the Austin Egoscue Clinic for providing these x-rays. A client working with one of the therapists was told he had to have his knee replaced. Take a look at the first x-ray picture from April, 2004 and you’ll understand why the doctor suggested it.

Image 1 - April 2004
Image
Image 2 - July 205
Image

To help explain what you’re looking at, it’s as if you are facing this client. His right knee is on your left. Notice that on the far left hand side of Image 1 there is decreased space between the femur (upper leg bone) and the tibia (lower leg bone). Loss of cartilage, right? I agree. This man is certainly headed for a knee replacement...or is he not?

Take a look at the second set of x-rays from July, 2005, just a little over a year after the first were taken. Notice the uniform spacing between the femur and tibia. It’s a miracle! The cartilage is regrown! The client took charge of his own health and put faith in his body that it can heal itself. What a remarkable difference, and all without going under the knife. When you switch from being symptom-focused (i.e. loss of cartilage and needing a knee eplacement) to being cause-focused (i.e. why did the cartilage degenerate?), a lot can happen. Change the position of the knee joint, give the cartilage room to grow, and it will.


Aloha, patty
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Re: Does cartilage loss cause knee pain?

Postby GeoffreyLevens » Sun Nov 19, 2017 8:48 am

Patty, lovely photos! Thanks for posting that

Rengenexx dietary advice is totally irrelevant. The point of that blog post was that joint pain (knees in particular) is NOT caused primarily by loss of cartilage. Cartilage is a very valuable cushion but you can do fine without much. Maybe not skiing bumps or playing tennis but for general daily living, walking, having an enjoyable healthy life, you may be just fine with not much cushion in there. At least according to what was posted, the main causes of pain are weak/misused connective tissue and muscles and inflammation. The term "arthritis" just means inflammation in joints. So yes, McDougall diet which is very anti-inflammatory along with moderate exercise and as needed, movement training should be the go-to treatments. Anything you can do to safely augment inflammation and misuse reduction (acupuncture, Egoscue, Pilates, massage of various types) are all just going to help the process along.
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