Kneetrackworld - Anyone had a partial meniscectomy?

Watching with interest. I too have a torn meniscus that isn't improving with physio. Hurts like a bastard when I'm trying to sleep.

Yep, had the medial meniscus removed on my left knee when I was 19, so the thick end of 30 years ago.

That knee is now fairly crap and achey, can't bend my foot to anywhere near my bum, so kneeling down is an impossibility. Walking downhill for a long way is really painful.

Much of this though, I suspect, is due to the rehab and physio I had at the time, which was all to do with building up the big muscles in my quads. I believe nowadays it's much more about flexibility and stability.

Thanks @IHN - how much did you have removed and what have you done with the knee since in terms of activity levels? Lifelong runner? Football? Just cycling?

I had a piece about the size of a king prawn removed, I think it was the whole thing TBH.

Cycling has always been the main thing I do, and that's not too bad, although it'll be a bit swollen and achey after a long road ride, and the jarring from an MTB ride doesn't do it any favours.

Skiing murders it, but I put up with it for a week, I used to play football a bit and that wasn't too clever either.

Again, though, I think with much better early rehab stuff, and to be honest more consistent stretching/strengthening exercises on my part ever since, it would be a whole lot better.

I'm starting a bit of a very late rehab attempt using some exercises I've found on YouTube. We'll see how that goes.

I had arthroscopy on my meniscus 2011 (not given or told about any rehab whatsoever), helped a good bit, but not great for long hiking and backpacking, by 2018 I'd had a partial knee replacement 😢 Any sporty twisting and turning was not an option! Badminton, volleyball stuff like that was out.

Brother had an arthroscopy maybe 5 years back, he was soon back long distance running and trail running.

I think you'll get as many good outcomes as you do bad, and it totally depends on your individual circumstances and issues.

But I'm pretty sure good strength and flexibility rehab makes a massive difference, as does getting on top of that before the op as much as you're able. I think it made a big difference when it came to my replacement as I'd worked hard to keep my quads and vmo in particular strong before that.

I was fine cycling after the arthroscopy. I am now after the knee replacement as long as I keep it spinny, low cadence high torque stuff like you often can't avoid off road doesn't go down well.

I had the horn of the medial meniscus removed in February. I’d torn it along with a medial collateral ligament sprain. Mine wasn’t getting any better with physio, I was still on crutches a month after damaging it.

I’ve got full flexibility back, strength isn’t there yet. I’ve given up single speeding, just too much strain on the knee. I still get odd twinges, especially with twisting motions.

My surgeon, also a cyclist, was against SPDs, running, and impact sports. But that was combined with lower spine issues I have.

Interesting, after my PKR I struggled on with SPDs, cos that's what cyclists use, but was getting inflammation and soft tissue issues. I've not had that since switching to flats, even on the road bike, The only issue has been when I've pushed it with low cadence/high torque.

Tore it a year ago and the repair in October and initially was very diligent with the physio but when I still couldn't run at Easter I gave up on the physio.

I have had no problem cycling or hiking I was hiking 16 miles in the snow by February and I was mountain biking at Christmas. Since then I have had some pretty big days on the bike on the road, MTB and Gravel and it's been fine. I'm planning to try running again soon.

I had a Right knee lateral bucket handle meniscectomy alongside ACLR (skiing) back in 2018. The meniscus tear had flapped up into the joint and was blocking flexion.

My meniscectomy and ACL rehab will have been different from just your medial meniscectomy of course, but have had no probs with the knee once i was able. Lots of kneehabilitation physio and strength and conditioning and cycling has been really important to maintaining function.
I make sure that I do regular kneehab S&C even when I'm on the bike a lot.
I did make a return to running, but taking it really easy, 1-on-1-off until i could run for longer periods

I would discuss with your knee man what he recommends, but I would expect you'd have good outcomes if managed and rehabbed well. Age shouldn't be an issue (I was 53 for ACLR which some orthopods thought too old), and restablishing mobility has been great.

Worth looking at insta kneesovertoesguy for some good knee stuff (some on STW mentioned a few months ago and it has been good)

@ihn you might want to take a look at kneesovertoes guy too, and doing lots of knee focussed S&C to restart rehab

I've damaged both left and right knee meniscus in my 30s, both through basketball.

I was lucky enough to come across a surgeon who specialised in meniscus repair, which he was able to do on the right knee. Benefits were that I got back to full use in basketball within a year with no pain - pretty unusual for your mid 30s and such an intensive sport for the joint, so the surgery did its job (as well as a full rehab regime in the gym and physio that you MUST do to recover properly). Downside was that it needed 6 weeks of total rest to work, crutches obligatory for about a month. This resulted in muscle atrophy to quads and my top end power on the bike was permanently reduced. However, power to weight ration seemed to improve, so swings and roundabouts.
I also had a partial meniscectomy on the other knee, as the tear did not have a good enough blood supply to make the repair work. Upside was that I was walking within days and could limit fitness loss. Downside was that the knee feels noticeably weaker when crouching.
Either way the learning point for me was that if you want to keep doing fun stuff then strength and conditioning is essential to protect your joints, particularly core. I don't really like gyms but I now spend lots of winter time building up the strength in the gym to not ruin my knees over the summer.

Hope that helps, good luck with the surgery and do the physio rehab, tedious as it is!

Currently in week 3 post surgery. Had a lateral tear tidied up, some cysts removed from the Hoffa fat pad and some micro fractures done to back of the knee cap. Was told I should be back to normal within 6 weeks

There has been a reasonable amount of secondary bleeding from the fat pad work so I am still hobbling around and struggling to sleep. Desperate to get on with the physio as I know it’s key but don’t yet have the flexibility due to the swelling. Hoping long term it’ll be good but it’s not always great from the outset post surgery.

Had one in 2013 luckily it was over winter. Had it done December 21st and had a small, flat bike ride beginning of February. No standing up on pedals, just sat and span in easy gears. Did this till April and then started to go harder, longer and more aggressive.
Make sure you do all physio exercises, get a soft squashy ball, place behind knee whilst sat and push down into ball, between both knees and push together, does wonders for your knee rehab.

Yes 5 times. Knee replacement next. Played lots of football and rugby.

Thanks everyone! Can't say that this is filling me with joy!

Jabs are great but they will always be a short term fix, as the doc who looked at my MRI said, 'you have sand in your engine, I can put some oil in there (a jab), or we can get rid of the sand'
As I understand things, if your meniscus is removed to such an extent that it exposes bone where there should be meniscus, you stand a very good chance of arthritis and then replacement.
My current condition (a lateral tear in the same spot I tore 13 years ago) means I can ride short distances on my road bike and ride motorcycle trials if I don't push things too much.
I want to speak to my previous surgeon to try to judge if I can get away with another trim, or whether it is so bad that I will risk arthritis. If the latter, I am happy to forgo the op until I can't handle the pain (if I push too much) any more. I'm 61 and still have a few goals in mind however.
From experience, good pre op physio work is very worthwhile, as it really helps recovery. As does following the advice of the surgeon and physios after the op.
Recognising what has caused the damage, as well as making sure you work to build stability and strength for the future, goes a long way to avoiding future problems.
Good luck with it, if it is just a quick trim, you should be fine.

Had a trim of my medial 4 years ago, like others just would not settle down and was very painful and swollen

Can ride my bike (SPDs) hard as I want and its fine pretty much although occassionally does ache after a heavy week of riding (like last week after 100 miles and 15,000ft of ebiking!)

skiing is fine,
running I no longer do as this is probably what caused it in the long term and want to save any cushion i have left in the knee!

I can tell the knee does feel not as good as the other and cant bend it as far etc.
but overall a huge improvement on just leaving the torn meniscus in there!

Update - I took the plunge on the partial menisectomy 3 weeks ago. I just couldn't get it to settle and the tear was getting worse (MRI'd twice, once in Jan and once June) - so can only assume the "catching" was tugging at it and unravelling it bit by bit.

Surgeon removed about 25%. They were reluctant to give me crutches. But I took them anyway. Within 2 days I was walking fine (including stairs) unaided and back up to about 5-8km walks per day. I was back on Zwift after about a week, just pedaling flat "non event" routes at a gentle pace.

3 weeks to the day and I had ridden outside once, but it is still nowhere near as strong as before. Also crunches a bit (not painfully) when I squat. Hoping that subsides. I also have a lump on the knee where the op took place...feels like scar tissue. Otherwise as good as can be expected. Just hope it continues to improve.

If you can I would recommend booking some sessions with a very good, private physio, and get some rehab exercises - and then do them religiously for as long as it takes.
The last thing you'll want to do now is think it's fine and then tear it again, resulting in another operation (unfortunately I speak from experience)

10 years later it's still holding up after 2 ops, just aches a bit in the cold sometimes

I had a meniscal debridement; that's trimming off the torn bit so that it doesn't get caught. I hadn't had any imaging, just general pain, and particular pain in the medial jointline.The consultant suggested arthroscopy to review the damage, followed by a separate arthroscopy to repair it if necessary. I asked if he could just do the one arthroscopy, and fix what he found, which he thought was fine, and what he did.

It was about an hour under general, and I walked out of the hospital. I think I was back at work next day, did the physio, mostly back to normal after 2 weeks but kneeling to longer. I didn't ride bikes then, but 6 months later I did a 14 day canoe trip, kneeling, and survived, although it was a bit sore towards the end. 18 years later it's not giving any problems.

That's pretty much what I had, @greybeard - removed the flappy torn bit and smoothed the surface. But that equated to about a 25% removal. Kneeling is definitely still out at the moment. Although not swollen, there are two "bumps" from the surgery that need massage to dissolve over time.

@ready - yes I have a physio and am religious on the rehab both from a strength and flexibility point of view. But I know how it goes...once you stop being aware of it because the pain resides, you forget about the rehab.

Anyway - surgeon has given the all clear to start light running on a treadmill and to cycle outside again. Yay!

Also crunches a bit (not painfully) when I squat.

Just spotted that bit. If I remember right, I was given physio to do, but nobody told me to avoid full squats, and I only found out later that I shouldn't have been going too deep. Worth checking?

Will do.... thanks.