Home treatment for knee injuries

[ABDR4]

To make a long story short, I basically have 1/2 my medial meniscus. A couple years ago I did something to the same knee so that my fibula would periodically dislocate. Now I did something worse and have a lot of pain in the outside of my knee & have a lot of pain if I bend it or put any pressure on the outside of it. I have another partial ligament tear in another joint, and this pain feels exactly the same.

I can’t see a doctor since none seem to understand what “mask triggers asthma & I’m allergic to asthma meds” means. I’ve tried. My current hinged knee brace isn’t supportive enough, but I have a new one coming. I tried some gentle isometric PT like what I did for my meniscus tear but it caused bruising & made things worse. In an ideal world, I’d see a doctor but that’s completely impossible. So I need to figure out how to manage this myself.

Aside from a good brace, does anyone have any suggestions for things I can do myself that might help?

[LilyandBaron]

Not getting deeply into the mask thing, but will doctors not accept face shields? Other than that, there are tons of online guides and YouTube videos to gentle knee exercises. But with my knee, my PT had me just start with gentle hamstring stretches. I set the bad leg up on a table or bed, good leg on the floor, and kept back very straight and just leaned forward slightly from the hip. My hamstring was insanely tight on the bad leg, despite stretching after workouts consistently! Apparently touching your toes with feet crossed didn’t hit the hamstrings well enough.

When ready to try some strengthening, I’d start with just lying down with the good knee bent/foot on the floor like doing a crunch, and have the bad leg straight and just flex the quad. Then try lifting that straight (bad) leg so the thighs are even. Can do that with foot straight and foot out to the side slightly. I’ve been in PT for a few months and when I added a resistance band and side stepping, knee gave a big middle finger. Just had an MRI and awaiting results, but I’m continuing with the exercises I can tolerate.

Good luck!