Why Is My Arthritis Causing Me So Much Pain?

Why Is My Arthritis Causing Me So Much Pain ?

As we discussed in our previous blog the pain associated with Arthritis often worsens as we age this is because the degeneration or the ability of the cartilage to heal slows down.
Pain can occur in more severe arthritis due the narrowed space and the bones “rubbing”.

More commonly I find pain occurs due to how our muscles respond to the changes that are happening inside.

Take a recent client of mine for example : Michael* had knee pain and arthritic changes from years of playing rugby, he had a classic swollen knee with reduced range of movement and found the morning time to be his most problematic time of day.

When we looked a little closer at how his muscles were working we found that he was not using his hamstring or groin muscles very well. As a result the muscles at the front of his leg were overused and tired. As I explained to Michael our joints rely on a support system and whilst we cannot necessarily “change or stop” what is happening in the joint itself we can definitely help influence muscle strength and function to take some of the pressure off. By correctly loading the right tissues we were able to improve his walking tolerance and reduced his morning symptoms. An assessment to see how you are moving and how well you are using other tissues can identify and correct these imbalances.