Diagnosed with Bursitis

[TwinTurbos]

I have been recently diagnosed with bursitis in my left knee. I have swelling on the front of my knee as well as a bump on the left side, just outside my kneecap (kind of reminds me of the lymphomas we find on our older dog - yuck!). The swelling is about the size of an egg by the end of the day. I have no pain but it is UGLY (and I'm vain:D ). I've been told to stay off of it as much as possible and ice it (yeah right! I'm a mom of 3, two of which are 5yo twins and I'm on my feet for work a good portion of the day.:yikes ). I've also been told I shouldn't exercise unless it's something in which I'm keeping my leg straight. I had been doing really well getting in shape on our rower we bought ourselves for Christmas from Concept2 and now I'm bummed I can't get on it. After pushing a little my doc did say I could get on our treadmill to walk. I'm supposed to take 600mg of ibuprofen twice a day too and I don't like taking stuff if I don't have to. I've had this swelling since August and just finally got around to going to the Dr. about it 2 weeks ago - my bad. If I had gone in sooner it probably wouldn't be this bad and then it would be easier to make it go away.:roll: If I can't get the swelling to go down with the ice and ibuprofen then I've been told the next steps may be to get a steroid shot or go to an ortho and have them take the fluid off my knee. I definitely don't want to do the steroid thing and I obviously don't want to go get my knee drained on a regular basis (but I would if that was my only choice). I've started taking glucosamine and msm and I'm trying to do what my doc told me (honestly, I haven't been very consistent yet) but I want to know if there are other treatments I haven't heard about.

Thank you for any insight you can give me.

Amy

[racer mom]

Don't know of any other treatments. I do know of quite a few people who've had their knee drained. Noone I talk too often, but I hear about it alot.

I know, that doesn't help :)

[Macho393]

just lump it off with a pocket knife...............but really shots ain't that bad. Might want to figure out why that leg is giving you trouble....could be shoe problems......really.

[drmark]

I usually try to do nothing. It amost always goes away in six to eight weeks. But, in your ulikely case, sometime the busa needs to be removd sugically. It pretty minor and shouldn't keep you off the bike more than ten days.

[TwinTurbos]

Thanks Macho...I'll get right on that pocket knife suggestion!:yikes I have stopped wearing my heeled shoes to work and have tried to wear my sneakers more but that hasn't seemed to help.

Dr. Mark - Since this has been going on since August I doubt it's just going to go away so I may have to resort to seeing an orthopedic surgeon to drain it or at the very least, get a second opinion. My doc said it was prepatellar bursitis and that it's caused by friction. I wish I knew why all of a sudden it became a problem. Can it be caused by injuries sustained as a teenager (I played sports) or hyperextension (my girls have bent my knee the wrong way a few times by jumping on me.) What are the side effects in the long run of removing the bursa entirely?

Thank you all for your responses.:thumb

Amy

[Riding the Metro]

Hey Amy, I can relate. I too had bursitis on the heels of my feet when I was about 23 years old. The doc is right that it will go away, eventually!
I had ultrasound therapy 3 days a week for 6-8 weeks before relief was felt and I could dispense with the "Caveman" walk.

As far cause...I dunno. Could it be it had something to do with racing those vibrating Husqvarna's all those years?

[tree11]

during a harescramble last summer,i went down hard on my elbow.
i was wearing cheap elbow guards.it`s not broke,doc said.it`s bursitis.
the swelling wouldn`t go down.doc drained it,then injected stroid.that helped,
but it`s still tender and funny looking.works ok most of the time.i hope i don`t
fall on it again.that`s all i know about bursitis.good luck.

[drmark]

sometimes there is a sharp spur on the subcutaneous bone that needs to be filed down. This is usually not a difficult problem to get right.

[TwinTurbos]

I'm giving it a couple more weeks to see if the swelling will go down and if not I'm going to make an appt. with an orthopedic surgeon. I really appreciate the feedback. It's nice hearing that these procedures are relatively simple and the recovery time is not long. I know it's a lesser problem than what others have but it really bugs me that there is something wrong in there!

[TwinTurbos]

So I finally went to an orthopedic surgeon. He said I have two choices, I can get my knee drained and get a cortisone shot which works about 50% of the time or I can get the bursa surgically removed. It looks like I have a cyst next to my knee cap, so he's speculating that it is pushing on my knee cap, misaligning it and causing the irritation. He said surgery has a 95% success rate with the other 5% having to get the area drained a few times before the body figures out it's not supposed to be putting fluid there. I would prefer the less invasive route but I'm not sure it will work. Thoughts?

Amy

[drmark]

If its been around for almost one year, its time to have it taken out.

[Walker Sky Ranch]

Dr Mark knows best.. have it removed Turbo!
Best of luck and a pre-speedy recovery.. wait till winter.. Ride now!

[TwinTurbos]

Just had it drained and got a cortisone shot. Had to do it just to see if I could avoid surgery. We will see...

Thank you for your input Dr. Mark. My doc basically said the same thing and was leaning towards surgery but I was kind of leery of going that route right away. I told him I just had to give this a try.

[Tatonka]

Man - I'm glad she finally got that thing drained! Maybe now she can get back to her regular slave like duties.....:D

[TwinTurbos]

I'm so fortunate to be married to such a funny guy. Oh joy! :)

It's now almost mid August and the swelling hasn't come back. I'm on the rower and treadmill again too. I have a feeling down the road I'll probably have to have surgery but for now it seems to be doing well. (Hopefully I didn't just jinx it!)