Chondromalacia Patellae

Chondromalacia patellae or Chondromalacia patella is quite common among healthy people.

 What is this “Patella”, and what is it for?

The kneecap, or patella, is a small bone that articulates with the femur, attached to the tendon of the quadriceps, and the patellar tendon attached to the tibia. Its principal function is to facilitate knee extension, allowing the tendon to exert a bigger leverage to the femur as it increases the action angle. It also covers and protects the anterior articular surface of the joint.

What is "Chondromalacia patellae"?

This patella, covered with a smooth cartilage that works as a shock absorber, glides along the knee when bending it. Some individuals have a problem with this action, as the kneecap rubs against one side of the joint, causing an irritation of the cartilage, damage in it, and a malfunction and pain as an ulterior result.
This pain typically occurs after long time sitting, that’s why is also called “movie sign” or “theatre sign”.

What are the causes?

Some of the causes are overuse, misalignment, bursitis, flat feet, core instability or patella maltracking. In my opinion, all these join into one: Wrong Leg Alignment, often due to a bad feet positioning.





How to treat “Chondromalacia patella”?

There are a few steps that you can do, besides corrective taping (very useful, a physiotherapist can teach you how to do this), but don’t hassle, it takes several weeks to get through the process:

-First step: Reduce/get rid of the pain: Avoid any motion which could irritate the kneecap (running, cycling, etc) and relieve the pain and the inflammation with anti-inflammatory medicines (e.g. Ibuprofen) and ice. It is possible and desirable to practise some physical activity like swimming (flutter kicks) or aquagym, strengthening the muscles under low impact exercises.

-Second step: It would be strengthening all the muscles around the area (Quadriceps, Hamstrings, Glutes, Calves and Kneecap muscles). (SEE IN THE NEXT POST).

*Of course, we need to check the cause of everything, and change it. It could be a wrong alignment of our bicycle (usually because the hips are too low so the knees need to bend further, causing the injury), our way of walking (bad alignment of the foot-knee-hip axis, leading to an imbalance), small chairs, flat feet (we can use shoe insoles), etc.

-Third step: After a while, and once we feel our knees are safer because of the improvement of our strength, we should combine those of strength with stretching exercises. (SEE IN THE NEXT POST).

-Fourth step: Balance and proprioception training. (SEE IN THE NEXT POST).

-Fifth step: Re-education of the altered functional patterns.

But, how do we do that?

I’m working on it at the moment, but you will need to wait until the next post (just a few days, I promise!).


Practise S.A.F.E.!