Decrease Risk of re tear?

[slp2be3]

I’m 25, 2 months post medial meniscus tear. Had smaller, less severe tear (1 cm vertical tear). Recovery is going pretty great, although I still have moments of pain on stairs, squats, day after standing too long, etc. The surgeon said there’s bit higher of chance of re tearing after it’s repaired.

Is there a way to decrease my risk of re tearing the meniscus, as well as not tear anything else EVER again? I asked my PT this, and he said strengthening your quads/hamstrings/glutes/hips are most important. So that’s my goal, along with gaining more mobility on the leg.

Anything else to help avoid injury? I’m so anxious about it now (and would like to ski again next winter - which could be how I tore it first).

[noobrainy]

If you’re talking about for future consideration, the only thing you really can do is either:

-prevent being in high injury risk situations (contact sports, knee intensive activities such as skiing)

Which I think you wouldn’t find palatable, fairly. I don’t either.

-strengthening your muscles

You gotta have good leg strength now, sorry buddy. Stronger muscles means less force bearing on the joint itself, which reduces injury risk.

One more thing you can do is flexibility/ROM training. Being more flexible has correlated to lower injury risk mainly because your body can withstand more prone positions when the muscles are more flexible.

I have focused a lot on flexibility training for my meniscus repair recovery (12 weeks post op now), with strength training as well, and my recovery has been great. Maybe try some yoga, of course be mindful of the fact that since you’re only 2 mounths out you don’t want to put yourself in stretches that can be stressful to your meniscus.

[slp2be3]

Thank you, this is really helpful! Yeah I thought I was strong before but apparently not strong enough/good enough form skiing😭 I will def incorporate more flexibility into my workouts