Pes Anserine Bursitis

I visited the Sports Medicine doctor yesterday for knee pain. After an exam and x-rays, I was diagnosed with Pes Anserine Bursitis. Click here for link to article.

I'm not sure how exactly I contracted it, but the pain started on Saturday after the 20 mile long run. I spent an hour at the computer with my knee in a kinked sitting position. Upon arising from the sitting position, I felt the torque on my knee. I didn't make much of it at that moment.

Waking up from sleep on Sunday I felt the most excruciating pain in the knee as I attempted to get up out of bed and straighten the leg. This pain was incredible. Yet after getting up and walking around, the pain disappeared. I even went on an easy run at the Zoo.

In the middle of the night on Monday morning, the extreme pain cropped up again. Man, I never felt such pain as I tried to straighten out the leg at the knee joint. It took several minutes to straighten it out. But once again, after getting up and out of bed and walking around the leg returned to normal. No pain.

Later that morning I cut short my trail run. For once, running on trails was more painful than running on pavement. My knee was not agreeing with the uneven terrain and lateral movement of the knee. Also, sitting at the desk became painful when my leg and knee was not entirely square. Apparently, I've discovered that I have poor sitting habits--I have a habit of dangling my legs and placing strain on my poor knee.

The good news is that this bursitis will not sideline me for long. I've been prescribed physical therapy for strengthening exercises and stretches for the hamstrings and quads. Although its feeling better already, I've decided to take a whole week off from running.

As an aside, one of our local running stores has an online bulletin board where Dr. Nilesh Shah answers sports injury questions. I posted my predicament there and he promptly answered my question.. He also has a policy to see patients within 24 hours of calling in. Kudos to the RunDoc for seeing me on short notice. I really appreciate this. At first, my amateur research pointed me to medial meniscus. But after his exam he ruled that out and gave me the diagnosis. Thank goodness that my predicament is not what I suspected!

Swimming pool, here I come!