Anyone riding with knee replacement ?

[SteveC]

I was diagnosed with osteoarthritis in my left knee..
Surgeon says there is very little cartilage left, soon to be bone on bone and that knee replacement/resurfacing is the only way to go at this point.
I am 51 yrs. old, I normally get 100 miles or more per week..been riding 20 yrs or so...
Anyone out there riding with a replaced knee ??
Will I be able to continue riding at all ??

Thanks,,,,Bummed,,,Steve

[sloji]

My brother had a knee replacement about 2 years ago and last year I did century ride with him and he's still strong as hell. He had a couple of glitches along the way and had to have a bit of leftover tidbits removed a week ago but he's back on the bike, indoors, training again. He switched to some short cranks, I think 155, to keep him spinning and not mashing and he can still manage very well.

I expect him to be back out there with me soon and he's 53...get some good docs and listen during the recovery process and go get em!

[jeffb]

Don't get rushed into surgery. Definitely get two or three opinions. Is the problem the left or medial compartment, ot both? My left knee has had surgery 3 times stemming back too a high school football injury in 1968 (I am 58). The menicus in the lateral compartment was removed in the first surgery and a torn ACL was not repaired because they did not know how to do that back then. Today, there is no menicus, no ACL, and the articular cartilage on both the femur and the tibia is worn through, leaving bone on bone. I can no longer run, snow ski, or the like (I raced tris for 11 years). BUT I ride appx 3,000 miles a year and compete in time trials. I climb sitting down and don't sprint, but, at this point, I can ride as much as I have time for. My point is there may be alot of room between how you describe your knee and a total knee replacement. The longer you wait, the better replacement you will get. Make sure you really trust your doctor and his/her opinion. For me, I am waiting until a knee replacement is the only hope I have to keep riding.

[kenw]

Ski injury 30+ years ago left me with no ACL, no medial meniscus, and
only a partial MCL in my left leg. I ride 6000 to 10,000 miles a year and have done 2 cross-country rides (3400 miles in 24 days, and 2900 miles in 25 days) on the knee. I no longer run or ski and walking is becoming a bit of a problem, but I have no intention of having
a knee replacement any time soon. I am planning a third cross-country in 2010. Don't make any hasty decisions, and, as someone above suggested, get second/third/etc opinions. Good luck. Ken

[WadePatton]

buddy of mine is. 71 when it got the double replacement. pretty sure running is what beat his knees up. he was back on the bike in no time. fwiw.

[inatis]

I had my left knee cap removed at the age of 17 (would never be done now) I also had worn out the cartilege in both knees and had microfracture in 2006 to both knees with great success. Rehab was slow, and with right knee I was on crutches non weight bearing for 6 weeks but I was still alllowed to spin on a windtrainer every day. Since then I have not looked back, regularly ride 350 - 500km per week, and race competitively. Maybe this is an option for you rather than knee replacement. Good luck.

[Ken C]

I have had 6 ACL operations and I am bone on bone with both knees. I had microfracture on both knees about 4 or 5 years ago. I also cycle about 3,000 miles a year and I have no daily knee pain at all. I did have to come to grips with what I could and could not do and have since I have eliminated all running and cutting activities.

My doctor pretty much ruled out all activities besides cycling and said I could expect to do it for a long time without problems.

I still do some walking and hiking with no problems, but all other activities have been eliminated.

The microfacture took about 2 years to recover from and cycling has really helped my knees to be pain free.

I do take fish oil pills and glucosomine as well. I know there are conflicting viewpoints on whether these work, but since I have been taking them I have felt great so I will continue to do so.

[jimp1234]

I'm a bit in the same boat. 58, been riding over 30 years, but with more and more time off because of knee problems over the last 5 years. Had several ski and cycling knee related injuries when I was young but fortunately not much ligament damage, and I also don't have much patellal chrondomalacia. Left knee has most damage (from a bike crash in the 70's) with a small "divot" in lateral femoral condyle. Had it debrided in a surgery in the 80's and flushed out in another surgery around 2001. Latest knee MRI shows moderate OA in both knees (more in left) but not even close to "bone on bone". This year I decided to be more aggressive, so started the beginning of the year staying off the bike and cutting back on most strenuous activity until I was close to pain free. Starting in March went for a series of 6 knee injections of hyaluronic acid (synvisc or the other product). These were not great for me, but I think provided some benefit. Ymmv.Then started some PT with a physio with some history of treating cyclists. He recommended more stretches than exercises, with a lot of emphasis on hip flexors, and hamstrings. So I've stated riding again once a week, flat for an hour or two, and while not perfect not much pain so far. My current plan is to use walking as part of my base building, and try to get add another ride mid week and see how it goes. Basically, this slow gradual build up is like water torture in terms of frustration but I'm going as far as I can with it. So my recommendation would be to try the synvisc if your insurance covers it, and if you can find a good PT, maybe give a shot. I'd also recommend giving your body a chance to heal itself by laying off (and maybe everything) for a while. I think the knee replacement may be a necessity at some point for me, but I've got it in my mind to fight it tooth and nail (and maybe this is stupidity on my part). I mean when you read about these joint replacements, they say that after the replacement you can do things again like gardening.... gardening??? ***...??? As was said earlier, get a second opinion, and if you go forward get the guy who's doing them all the time. There are also some new "partial" replacements available. Do a google for tri-athlete knee. Also as the ol saying goes asking a surgeon if you need surgery, is like asking a barber if you need a haircut... Good luck in whatever you decide to do.

[JohnC]

Well, since this seems to be the place to share stories here's mine.

I'm 57. 35 years ago most of my left medial meniscus was removed from a hockey injury. 10 years ago I had a scope on the same knee to fix another tear. No bone on bone but some Grade III/IV chondromalacia per the MRI. The last few years I've had synvisc shots about once a year and they worked great. Last year they only lasted 6 months. The next series of shots didn't work at all. Since last summer I have had what I would call tolerable pain. I could get some bad pain for short periods of time while riding but I could mainly do hard rides up to 40-50 miles and sometimes longer. The pain was mainly when I would hammer hard for short durations and then a lot of ache after the ride that would usually pass by the next day. But it did seem to be getting worse.

This year for a couple of months some glucosamine and more shots of synvisc seemed to help and the pain left long enough for me to train and ride a tough century. Since that ride a month ago the pain is much worse. I had a cortisone shot before the ride and it didn't help at all. After this year's MRI the doctor says I need a partial replacement but I'm too active. He is a knee specialist and I have great faith in him since he has been treating me for various orthopedic ailments for almost 30 years. He is sending me to another specialist for a second opinion which I will get tomorrow.

At this point I can ride easy for 25-30 miles and it will ache but I can live with it. It aches moderately 24/7. Any hard riding and the pain is brutal. No more "training" rides, No more serious climbs (I like to climb). No more hammering down Laguna Canyon to the beach. I will not make any decision in haste but I will tell you quality of life is important to me and the riding I've done the last month really sucks. Waiting until you are old enough to have no use for the new knee is BS. Wait until they can assure me they can bury me with it? F that. If getting it done now means I can ride like I did before and maybe down the road it needs replacing, well, that sounds a lot better to me than being restricted from doing what I want because of the pain. But I'm still hoping they can find something in that MRI the might indicate another scope might buy me a couple or more years.

[Louis]

A silly and hopefully irrelevant question, but I'll ask it just the same (primarily because it occurred to me back in the days when I used to have lots of knee problems - tweaking my saddle height seems to have fixed 95% of that):

Let's say knee issues (or some other health-related issue) prevents you from cycling as you do today, would you:

a) Give up cycling in favor of something else which you can do with nearly the same degree of intensity as cycling, but is probably not nearly as much fun? (Here I'm thinking swimming, which I assume is not that tough on your knees.)

or would you

b) Continue to cycle as much as you can, but do much slower and shorter rides?

or

c) Some combination of the above.

[97CSI]

Don't get rushed into surgery. Definitely get two or three opinions. Is the problem the left or medial compartment, ot both? My left knee has had surgery 3 times stemming back too a high school football injury in 1968 (I am 58). The menicus in the lateral compartment was removed in the first surgery and a torn ACL was not repaired because they did not know how to do that back then. Today, there is no menicus, no ACL, and the articular cartilage on both the femur and the tibia is worn through, leaving bone on bone. I can no longer run, snow ski, or the like (I raced tris for 11 years). BUT I ride appx 3,000 miles a year and compete in time trials. I climb sitting down and don't sprint, but, at this point, I can ride as much as I have time for. My point is there may be alot of room between how you describe your knee and a total knee replacement. The longer you wait, the better replacement you will get. Make sure you really trust your doctor and his/her opinion. For me, I am waiting until a knee replacement is the only hope I have to keep riding.Amen........no menicus and ~50%tear in the ACL in my right knee. This was a college football (the round, black & white ball) injury some 30+ years ago. I'm 61 and have had very few problems cycling up to 5K per year. My left hip is cratering (necrosis?), but my right knee is at least the equal of my left. As the surgeon ask when he was getting me prepped for surgery way back when........"are you going to make a living with that knee or should I do the least invasive procedure to give you the best long-term knee?" Never allow anyone to cut you more than is absolutely necessary.

[dogdriver]

I know too many local guys to count who have recovered from either knee replacements or significant knee ops (me among them) who are at least as active as they were prior to the injury, and far more capable than they were with the pre-op issues. A full recovery is an understatement. In fact, Vern Cooley (the doc who did Tiger Woods, me, and thousands of others in between) says that cycling is the best thing you can do for post-op knee health (even better than watching TV in the lounger, has something to do with distribution of synovial fluid or something else I can't spell).

Find a good doc, get a couple of opinions, and get healed. Orthopedics are probably the most useful docs around for maintaining quality of life as long as you're lucky enough to avoid the nightmare health issues...

Cheers, Chris

[SteveC]

Thanks for all these responses....Plenty of good info, I trust the people in this forum and I feel much better about this rightnow...
Thankyou....Steve