There are many, many different types and locations of knee pain and a variety of causes. Quite often, there will be accompanying symptoms that are helpful to identify in order to determine the proper course of action in resolving the pain. Use our handy knee pain symptoms list below to help you out:
- Check if you knee is swollen or larger than normal. If you can’t immediately tell, sometimes it’s helpful to push lightly on your injured knee with your finger and then push in the same spot on your healthy knee and feel for differences. If the injured knee is much softer, it is likely that you have swelling and should consider applying ice and/or using an anti-inflamatory like ibuprofen.
- You may also be experiencing stifness of your knee. If you have swelling, applying ice and/or taking ibuprofen may be helpful. If the injury is from activity, rest will be helpful
- If you are experiencing weakness or instability on your knee, rest is the best answer. However, if you can’t bear any weight on the knee, unfortunately it’s time to go see your doctor as the injury may be serious (like a fracture or toren ligament)
- Crunching or poping noises coming from your knee can be difficult to diagnose. Some people, especially when going through growth spurts in their teens, experience this as part of growing. However, if you are having knee pain that accompanies the crunching or poping, you should probably get checked out by a doctor
- If you are unable to straigten your knee or are experiencing “locking” of the knee, you need to go see a doctor. There is no home soluation that is going to remedy this.
- If you have a fever in addition to any of the above symptoms, you should go see your doctor immediately as the knee pain may be a symptom of something more serious.