18 months ago I had an arthroscopy, a good chopping of the junk cartilidge in my knee. some improvement and 15 miles every day cycling has fixed it for normal use although its a touch fragile. Walking especially down hill causes greif and is enough to keep me to about 10 miles a day before seriuos limping starts. anyone know of any decent knee braces out there that reduce the load on the knee joint. something that sits between the lower thigh and my calf maybe. I am trying to keep the knee out of the system. Surgeon and GP useless and unsysmpathetic suggesting I look on the web! So I am . I suspect this isn't going to be cheap. Stiffened neoprene braces do nothing really.

Any ideas?

do you mean a brace to ride in or to walk in..
i had a reconstruction 9 yrs ago and a arthroscopy 18 month ago…the knee is worse than before the arthroscopy..

i tried to use a hinged brace to start with, no good at all for riding.
you never get the full movement with one…
on real bad days i use one of these..

it helps a great deal..
but do not get used to using it all the time….
it will stop you building the muscle around the knee..

I have a blown acl but want to snowboard so my Insurance company has told me to order one of these,went to get measured up for it on Friday,the doctors etc were very confident it would do the job and its prescribed a lot for knee pain from Osteoarthritis etc
cti2

not cheap though,$1500-glad the ins is paying 😯

deserter – that brace looks the business but glad I'm not paying.

I have been using a support a bit like the one in the picture

I think it cost about £30 when I bought it a couple of years ago! It has plastic hinged pieces on either side of the knee which really do provide support. Also, the knee may just benefit from the warmth of being encased in Neoprene!

I've had 2 arthroscopies one side and one on the other, due hypermobile joints. I looked at braces but was eventually put off them by all the physios. I have had reasonable success with various glute strenthening excercises etc and can jsut about kep the ache under control (never goes away though and knees always tender to the touch)

I would be loathe to let surgeon back in though, as Ton says…

ask on an mx forum. mx trax most likely. dont expect the answer to be cheap though… think CTI braces are circa £400…. (each!)

I got one off the NHS – single user for my cruciate 4 years ago worth £300 – I don't use it anymore – its even got a little bag 🙂

Would poles help with the walking? My wife's uncle whose in his mid sixties has started using them and it's allowed him to carry on with Himalayan treks despite his dodgy knees.

I'm lucky and have never had serious knee trouble *touches wood* but used to use asterisk cell braces when I was riding motocross, went for the whole prevention is better than cure theory. Never knew I was wearing them when riding and were surprisngly comfortable off the motorbike but must admit only ever used them when I was riding the bike and don't know what they'd be like walking serious distance?? Sizing is easy to work out too.

http://www.asteriskkneebraces.com/asterisk-cell-knee-brace.html

I got mine from a company called BTO sports in the USA and never got stung for any duty and bought them when exchange rate was pretty good. They also were delivered very quickly considering the distance they came.
There is plenty of mx shops in the uk which stock them though so would be worth trawling round and trying out a few different manufacturers out before parting with any cash, a good set is going to make a serious dent in your wallet

Just to contradict myself though I know a chippy who wears a CTI brace almost all of the time due to quadracep and knee surgery after years of muay thai abuse and he swears by it, was rather expensive though…

Re reading that post it doesn't really offer much but gives you another option I guess…

For all of you with knee problems what is the problem, what caused the problem and what are your muscles like around your knees?

I'm doing the knee at uni just now and am interested to hear some real life stories.

matt
I also had an arthroscopy almost exactly one year ago. Have had lots of problems and the knee didnt feel like it was anywhere near as good as before the op. However, visited a physio who has lots of experience treating pro sports people – ATP tour, pro rugby teams athletes etc. He recommended building muscle around the knee and gave me a weights programme of 4-6 weeks. Basically consists of partial leg presses and squats one leg at a time. These are carried out so as not to engage the buttocks in the movement. – as I proudly tell everyone I can now do 8 reps x 140 kg ( one leg). The difference it has made to my knee is amazing and I now have close to full range of movement and my knee feels so much better.

I rutured my PCL on the Dyffi enduro 3 years ago – end of! 🙂

Goan – most of my problems with my knees are down to hypermobility in the knee and other joints. I have had a few rounds of arthroscopy and a lot of physio, with mixed results. Most of the physios have not been that good. SpaceClinics in Edinburgh are very good but not handy for me (stay in Glasgow). Glute strengthening excercises have helped a fair bit, but I stlll am seeking a solution…….

Goan-had a heavy impact on my left knee when 13,everytime I played football after my knee would literally twist,you could push my knee cap around to the side of my knee with no pain at all,had an op which stopped the knee cap thing but whilst doing rehab did my cartelidge,waited 10 years for the nhs to show any interest in the cartelidge,had the arthroscopy and was told my acl was blown,saw the pics and it was on by a thread,so started biking,knee was ok{7 years on} till last year when it went again running,been ok since inc running but I think snowboarding may be a leap too far hence the custom brace

matt
sorry for the hijack I waswondering if you reallywere contemplating selling the Ergos?

I'm going to echo some of the above comments and suggest you get yourself to a physio and get some advice on exercise and strength building for your knee.

I ended up with a ruptured patella tendon when a car cut across my path , spent 5 months on crutches and hours in tears trying to get everything working again. Tried wearing supports but they just weren't that comfy and you start to rely on them too much , I work as a postie(yeah,yeah when I'm not on strike 🙄 )and find the almost daily exercise is the best thing for my knee as when I'm on holiday things start to seize up if I don't exercise.

I use a CTi for windsurfing & snowboarding, but there is no substitute for working on strength & proprioception.

I have knee pain from chondromylacia ( sp) since cycling a lot more it is lessened because of the strong quads.

the main issue is walking downhill – and using Leki poles has virtually eliminared that – tho it does agravate teh arthritis in my hands and the damaged ligaments in my shoulder.