Physio made my injury worse?
Discussion
Strained my Popliteal muscle (apparently) during football resulting in pain at the back of my knee. I iced it and seemed to be healing well. A few days later I went to my private physio for an unrelated issue and mentioned the injury, and she did some massage or active release therapy I think it's called which felt unusually painful but I thought she must know what she's doing as it has helped in the past. So this was last week and the area still aches and is painful when pressing on it. in fact, I think it may have exacerbated it. Is it possible she worked on the injury too early? Any physios on here that can provide some guidance would be appreciated.
I believe this happened to me too. My left hip suddenly seemed to give out in an excruciating way after helping someone move house. Visit to A&E without conclusive results, followed by a failed attempt at a face to face with my GP, then decided to go private via Bupa. Video call first said I needed an MRI to see what was going on but this was later refused as they wanted to try physiotherapy first.
Physiotherapist saw the trouble I was in and told me to stretch the muscles around there, even though she couldn't do it herself.
Like you, I thought it for the best and really went through the pain barrier believing it would help, if a professional had advised this.
All that happened was that I got so bad that on my second PT appt., she gave up and told me to see a hip consultant, which I have been waiting 3 weeks for now.
Yes, I believe the physiotherapy stretching was advised far too early, and certainly before the initial trauma had died down. How can they tell what, where or how severe the damage is if they don't do an MRI first.
Since I stopped the stretching my daily pain has now eased off and I shall only start again once the specialist sees the issue.
I think I have a grade 3 tear of one of the muscles and it needed to recover a lot more with rest, ice etc. before the trauma of intensive PT.
Physiotherapist saw the trouble I was in and told me to stretch the muscles around there, even though she couldn't do it herself.
Like you, I thought it for the best and really went through the pain barrier believing it would help, if a professional had advised this.
All that happened was that I got so bad that on my second PT appt., she gave up and told me to see a hip consultant, which I have been waiting 3 weeks for now.
Yes, I believe the physiotherapy stretching was advised far too early, and certainly before the initial trauma had died down. How can they tell what, where or how severe the damage is if they don't do an MRI first.
Since I stopped the stretching my daily pain has now eased off and I shall only start again once the specialist sees the issue.
I think I have a grade 3 tear of one of the muscles and it needed to recover a lot more with rest, ice etc. before the trauma of intensive PT.
Stretching or massage is unlikely to make an injury worse, although it can sometimes make it more painful and simply highlight the underlying cause.
For the OP, the massage on the back of the knee has possibly released the tension. If, for example, the muscle had become tight (which feels like a strain but is a reaction to overuse), it will be bruised and sore. Releasing that is good but it will hurt more in everyday use while it recovers. If you'd not had the massage, you may well have felt better next week, but done the injury again as soon as you played footie again.
I'm not a physio or remotely qualified, but i've been injured dozens of times and have had these explanations from the physio's I've used in the past. I've suffered from a lot of muscular and tendon injuries in the leg and foot in the main. Main point is to always understand the cause, which is almost always above or below the point of pain.
For the OP, the massage on the back of the knee has possibly released the tension. If, for example, the muscle had become tight (which feels like a strain but is a reaction to overuse), it will be bruised and sore. Releasing that is good but it will hurt more in everyday use while it recovers. If you'd not had the massage, you may well have felt better next week, but done the injury again as soon as you played footie again.
I'm not a physio or remotely qualified, but i've been injured dozens of times and have had these explanations from the physio's I've used in the past. I've suffered from a lot of muscular and tendon injuries in the leg and foot in the main. Main point is to always understand the cause, which is almost always above or below the point of pain.
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