Patellar tendonitis exercises to avoid

 

Patellar tendonitis, commonly known as jumper’s knee, is an injury that affects the patellar tendon. Caused by the inflammation of the tendon that joins the kneecap(patella) and the shin bone(tibia), patellar tendonitis often develops from repetitive jumping, running and other high impact activities in general. 

 

It should not be surprising then, that athletes tend to develop this particular injury more often than non-athletes. That doesn’t mean a normal(non-athlete) person cannot pick up patellar tendonitis at all however. 

 

If you are dealing with patellar tendonitis, you should know about the different exercises to avoid in your recovery. Before we get into patellar tendonitis exercises to avoid, let’s first go through the different indications of patellar tendonitis.

Symptoms of patellar tendonitis:

Let’s look at the different symptoms of patellar tendonitis:

• Like with most injuries, pain is the first symptom of patellar tendonitis. For this particular ailment, the pain is usually felt between your kneecap and shin bone (in other words, the region where the patellar tendon is located). 
• Initially, the pain is felt just before or after you are done with a physical activity. Over time however, the degree of pain increases and can start interfering with day-to-day movements like standing from a chair and climbing stairs.
• Other than pain in the front of your knees, which is very easy to gauge, other symptoms of patellar tendonitis include tenderness in your kneecap (present even after a light touch) and stiffness which makes straightening and bending your knee difficult.
• Swelling and a burning feeling in the kneecap is also a common indication of patellar tendonitis.

Risk Factors:

While patellar tendonitis can happen to anyone, there are certain risk factors that increase the possibility of the injury. Let’s analyze them:

High Impact Physical Activities: 

The disease is called jumper’s knee, after all!  High impact physical activities like running and jumping can increase the risk of contracting patellar tendonitis. 

 

This is specifically true for athletes whose sports include running, jumping and changing directions at a quick pace. Think of basketball, volleyball and track and field events.

Tight Thigh Muscles:

Thick quadriceps(thigh muscles) and hamstrings can increase the tension in your patellar tendon which can cause inflammation.

Unbalanced Muscles in your leg:

If some muscles in your leg are much weaker than the others, the stronger muscles could pull harder on your tendon, and this unequal pull can result in tendonitis.

 

You might also like: How to deal with pelvic pain when sleeping at night?

Patellar Tendonitis Exercises to avoid:

Now that we’ve gone over the symptoms and risk factors for patellar tendonitis, let’s fulfill the main objective of this article and learn about patellar tendonitis exercises to avoid and why.

Squats:

As we’ve emphasized during this article, over-exerting pressure on your tendons is a sure-fire method to make your injury worse.

 

And squats, specifically deep squats apply a lot of pressure on your tendons as they require consistent up and down motion for the knee. This is why squats are an exercise to avoid if you have patellar tendonitis.

Running:

Similar to squats, running increases the stress on the tendon, which is why you should avoid it.

 

However, you should know that running on harder surfaces is more likely to make your patellar tendonitis worse. So, if you must run, softer surfaces and low intensity are advised.

Jumping:

This is getting a little repetitive, but jumping which also stresses your tendon, is not recommended as a recovery exercise for patellar tendonitis. This means it is a patellar tendonitis exercise to avoid. 

 

It is commonly believed that patellar tendonitis occurs due to excessive strain and overuse of the tendon. This means that we have to build up the strength of the tendon before attempting a high impact exercise like jumping.

 

You might be interested in: Breastbone Pain | Causes | Symptoms | Treatment |

Exercises for patellar tendonitis:

Now that we’ve discussed patellar tendon exercises to avoid, let’s look at what actually works.

Isometric exercises: 

Isometric exercises include wall sits and straight leg raises which maintain strength without excessive strain.

Eccentric exercises: 

Exercises like slow, controlled squats or step downs help rebuild tendon strength.

Strengthening the supporting muscles :

Focusing on glutes, hamstrings, and core can strengthen your supporting muscles and reduce the pressure on your knee.

Gradual loading: 

Slowly reintroducing resistance training once pain subsides is seen as an effective method for recovery.

If the pain because of your patellar tendonitis worsens, you should contact a medical professional immediately for their opinion.

You can do so by booking a consultation here.