We get so many patients blaming their knee pain on their ‘arthritis’ because they’ve had a scan from their GP which shows they have arthritis. But after a thorough assessment we determine that the primary diagnosis is not arthritis, but instead something else (example: fat pad irritation, patello-femoral pain syndrome, etc.)
Our medical system is very heavily based on two things – scans (x-rays, MRI’s, CTs) and pharmaceuticals (panadol, ibuprofen, etc.). Any good health professional that does more and more research realises that this can’t be a good foundation to accurate health care, it’s not sustainable for human health!
Research has shown that scans are not as reliable as we thought they once were. Its not that they are inaccurate, it’s the information that they tell us which may not be as significant to us as we once thought they were.
Did you know this fact – osteoarthritic changes begin at the age of 20-25? (University of Michigan, June 2020). Okay, well did you feel knee pain in your 20’s? Most likely not!
There was a huge study done in 2018 by the British Journal of Sports Medicine (BJSM). They assessed MRI scans of patients with no knee pain and had no injuries – healthy knees!
Keep in mind again – ALL these patients had no knee pain whatsoever and had no knee injuries!
SO, WHAT DOES THAT TELL US?
The research suggests to us that, “OA features on MRI are common in asymptomatic uninjured knees and are generally associated with age,” (BJSM, 2018).
So essentially, these are all normal changes that humans experience and they don’t necessarily mean pain. Do wrinkles mean anything? No! Do wrinkles mean cancer? No! it’s just a part of the normal aging process! Just as the knee research study mentions, “these features reflect normal age-related changes,” (BJSM, 2018).
This is why we shouldn’t heavily rely on scans, as they do not tell us the complete story! We aren’t saying you can never get a scan, we just use the scan as an another piece to the puzzle to collect the full story instead of the only piece to the puzzle.
The way we take care of our patients at Agape Physio, is that we listen to you! We listen to all your concerns and your questions, we then complete a thorough assessment, looking at you as a human rather than just your one joint. And then from what you have told us and from what we have found during our assessment, we are able to make a confident diagnosis. We treat you as a human rather than a problem or injury walking through the door.
If you want to find the right answers and finally get yourself back living your life, give us a call and book an appointment – we partner with you back to health and mobility.
