Published on: January 29, 2024 | Updated on: January 18, 2025
Do you often hear your loved one complain that ‘my knee hurts when I bend it?” Or do you yourself go through this excruciating pain while exercising or stretching?
Knee pain while bending is pretty common, and many people suffer from it. It can range from mild to severe and can affect your lifestyle by a great deal.
You may find yourself thinking twice about getting up from a sofa. Similarly, exercising, a healthy activity, may become more of a burden and a painful experience than a way to keep fit.
So, what should be the best way to keep this pain at bay? You must first understand the reason for knee pain and then look for a remedy.
This discourse helps you find all you need to know to make your knee feel as healthy as possible.
My Knee Hurts When I Bend It! – Causes Explored
Have you ever considered the number of times you bend your knees every day? Well, there are many instances, such as while exercising and climbing stairs, when you use your knees to accomplish a task.
The constant use of your knees can cause their wear and tear sooner than you may expect. Similarly, your knees have several ligaments, muscles, and bones, and these can cause pain when affected.
Not all knee pains are bothersome. Some are minor and have home remedies to treat them. For major pains, it is best to take a professional’s help.
Here are some possible conditions that might cause pain in your knees when bending them:
Patellar Tendonitis
This condition commonly affects athletes and is an inflammation or injury of the tendons that connect your shinbone to your kneecap. You may feel constant pain or burning on your kneecap’s base.
Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome
Trauma and overuse of your knees’ joints can cause this issue. With this problem, you may experience constant pain around your kneecap and the front of the knee.
Hamstring Tendonitis
It is often caused due to the inflammation of muscles in your lower legs. As a result, you constantly suffer from pain behind your thigh and knee.
Iliotibial Band (IT) Syndrome
This health issue causes severe pain in your knees that eventually spreads to your hips.
Osteoarthritis
This problem is caused by the wear and tear of joints. You may experience stiffness in your knees and consistent pain and swelling, especially right after waking up.
Baker’s Cyst
It is a fluid-filled swelling that might produce a lump at the back of your knee. You may experience tightness and swelling in your knees, leading to pain when bending them.
Quadriceps Tendonitis
This problem is related to the swelling of a tendon. In this condition, you may suffer from pain in your knee’s back and front parts.
Diagnosis of Your Knee Pain
Finding the real cause is tough, but by knowing the correct location of the knee pain, doctors can help you. For instance, if you feel the pain behind your knee when it bends, know that it may be due to a knee injury, Baker’s cyst, or Hamstring tendonitis.
Alternatively, if there is very sharp pain, you may be a victim of osteoarthritis, patellar tendonitis, or torn ligaments. In addition, problems like knee bursitis, Osteoarthritis, or Quadriceps Tendonitis usually cause pain above the kneecap.
Finally, pain in front of your kneecap while bending is often a result of patellar fracture, quadriceps tendonitis, or patellofemoral pain syndrome.
It isn’t right bearing the pain and waiting for it to go on its own. Instead, you should approach a doctor or an expert as soon as possible to find the proper remedy for the problem that has affected your activity tremendously.
Best Home Remedies for Knee Pain
If you have mild knee pain, certain home remedies and life changes might be enough to give you relief.
For instance, you may want to shift from high-impact to low-impact activities. If you are into strenuous exercise, opt for cycling, swimming, and walking for some time.
You can also follow the RICE treatment. What’s that? RICE stands for Rest, Ice, Compress, and Elevate.
Give your knee a good amount of rest. While doing so, place ice wrapped in a cloth on your knee for 20 minutes multiple times daily.
Also, compress your knees and muscles with an elastic bandage. Finally, elevate your knee as many times as possible to reduce swelling.
A good massage and heat treatment may also prove beneficial here. Anti-inflammatory medications might also play a significant role in alleviating pain.
Orthobiologic Treatments for Knee Pain
If your knee pain worsens and persists with time, you might have to undergo Orthobiological treatments. These non-invasive processes include cell-based therapies and platelet-rich plasma therapy.
Cell-based Therapies
Stem cell therapy extracts healthy cells from your body and returns them to the injured site. There are two types of treatments, Minimally Manipulated Adipose Tissue (MMAT) transplant and Bone Marrow Concentrate (BMAC). Your doctor may select any of these, depending on certain conditions like your health, age, etc.
Platelet-rich Plasma Therapy
PRP involves isolating platelets, processing them, and re-injecting them on an injured site. This therapy ensures that a good amount of platelets heal your injury pain faster than any medication. And the good thing is that PRP is performed within 45 minutes.
At CELLAXYS, we perform both of these procedures with practical consequences. People who go through them often report zero knee pain on bending.
Preventing Knee Pain
Prevention is better than cure, right? So, if you don’t want to cry the lines, “My knee hurts when I bend it,” when visiting a doctor and also wish to stay safe from surgeries or treatments, take measures to prevent the pain from happening in the first place.
For instance:
- Limit your movement to prevent overusing your muscles and tendons.
- If you are overweight, lose weight to keep your body fit. Extra weight can stress your body, leading to knee injuries or pain.
- Ensure you properly warm up and cool down before and after every exercise.
- Stretching can help you improve your body’s flexibility and loosen all your tight muscles.
Sources
Footnotes
- Cutbill JW, Ladly KO, Bray RC, Thorne P, Verhoef M. Anterior knee pain: a review. Clinical journal of sport medicine. 1997;7(1):40-5.
- Duri ZA, Aichroth PM, Wilkins R, Jones J. Patellar tendonitis and anterior knee pain. The American journal of knee surgery. 1999;12(2):99-108.
- Petersen W, Ellermann A, Gösele-Koppenburg A, Best R, Rembitzki IV, Brüggemann GP, Liebau C. Patellofemoral pain syndrome. Knee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy. 2014;22:2264-74.
- Spicer DD, Blagg SE, Unwin AJ, Allum RL. Anterior knee symptoms after four-strand hamstring tendon anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. Knee Surgery, Sports Traumatology, Arthroscopy. 2000;8:286-9.
- Noble CA. Iliotibial band friction syndrome in runners. The American journal of sports medicine. 1980;8(4):232-4.
- Dulay GS, Cooper C, Dennison EM. Knee pain, knee injury, knee osteoarthritis & work. Best Practice & Research Clinical Rheumatology. 2015;29(3):454-61.
- Dainese P, Wyngaert KV, De Mits S, Wittoek R, Van Ginckel A, Calders P. Association between knee inflammation and knee pain in patients with knee osteoarthritis: a systematic review. Osteoarthritis and Cartilage. 2022;30(4):516-34.
References
- Knee Pain When Bending? Here’s What You Can Do About It. The Guthrie Clinic. Accessed 9/4/2023.
- What Causes Knee Pain When You’re Bending It, and How’s It Treated? Healthline. Accessed 9/4/2023.
- 7 Reasons Your Knee Hurts When You Bend It. Healthcare Associates of Texas. Accessed 9/4/2023.
CELLAXYS does not offer Stem Cell Therapy as a cure for any medical condition. No statements or treatments presented by Cellaxys have been evaluated or approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This site contains no medical advice. All statements and opinions are provided for educational and informational purposes only.
Dr Pejman Bady
Author
Dr. Pejman Bady began his career over 20 years ago in Family/Emergency Medicine, working in fast-paced emergency departments in Nevada and Kansas. He has served the people of Las Vegas as a physician for over two decades. Throughout this time, he has been met with much acclaim and is now the head of Emergency Medical Services in Nye County, Nevada. More about the doctor on this page.
Dr Pouya Mohajer
Contributor
Pouya Mohajer, M.D. is the Director of Spine and Interventional Medicine for CELLAXYS: Age, Regenerative, and Interventional Medicine Centers. He has over 20 years of experience in pain management, perioperative medicine, and anesthesiology. Dr. Mohajer founded and is the Medical Director of Southern Nevada Pain Specialists and PRIMMED Clinics. He has dedicated his career to surgical innovation and scientific advancement. More about the doctor on this page.