Knee Injections for Osteoarthritis Treatments

Dec 01, 2020

Do you have stiff, sore, or swollen knees? If so, you might have osteoarthritis. To ease the symptoms of the disease, your dentist can consider pills, surgery, or intravenous treatments. Depending on the severity, your doctor can consider knee injections to ease joint pain.

When your doctor injects the treatments into the knee, you will experience fewer symptoms after some weeks or months. Some of the symptoms of osteoarthritis on the knee include:

Pain on the affected joints
Stiffness when you wake up or after being inactive
Feeling of tenderness on the knee when you apply light pressure on the knee
You might not be able to move your knee to the full range of motion
Cracking or popping sound on the knee when you stretch your legs
Formation of lumps around the joints
Swelling around the knee joints

If you experience the symptoms above, you should consider visiting a medical clinic in Cypress, Westchase or W. Bellfort, Houston for osteoarthritis injections.

Causes of Osteoarthritis

Inflammation on the knee is a result of worn-out knee joints. Osteoarthritis most occurs midlife or during old age. However, you might experience arthritis before old age. When the cartilage between the knee joints wears out, you might start experiencing pain in your knees when you move.

Complications Associated with Osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis is a degenerative condition. Therefore, the disease worsens over time. Sometimes you might experience chronic pain and severe stiffness if osteoarthritis is left untreated. The pain and discomfort you experience as a result of untreated osteoarthritis can cause depression.

Therefore, you should consider visiting a doctor near you for urgent medical care in Houston and Cypress, TX.

Types of Knee Injections

There several types of knee injections to treat osteoarthritis, which includes:

Corticosteroid Injections

Steroid injections work by improving your immune system. The immune system then reduces inflammation. A corticosteroid is similar to cortisol, a natural hormone in your body.

One of the common corticosteroids is hydrocortisone. Hydrocortisone injection into the knee joint enhances your immune system. The immune system then works on the inflammation in your knee, relieving joint pain.

Fluid Aspiration

Your knees contain synovial fluids with the joints. The synovial fluids lubricate the knee joints causing ease of movement through the range of motion. Inflammation in the joints can cause the accumulation of the synovial fluid in your knee.

To reduce the fluid around the knees, your doctor might consider fluid aspiration. The fluid aspiration takes out the excess fluids in your knee, providing pain relief and reducing swelling. If your doctor suspects you have an infection in your knee, your doctor might recommend fluid aspiration as the best knee injection for you.

Lubrication Injections

If you don’t have obvious signs of osteoarthritis, your doctor might recommend hyaluronic injections to provide a cushion on your joints. The hyaluronic acid is similar to the components of your joint fluid. Therefore, the hyaluronic injections provide lubrication between the knee joints.

Knee Injection Procedure to Treat Osteoarthritis

When you seek osteoarthritis treatments in our knee injection program, our doctor will examine your knees first to determine the severity of the inflammation. Knee injection treatment is an outpatient procedure. Therefore, your doctor will release you to go home after the knee injections.

During the osteoarthritis knee injections procedure, Dr. Smitha Mantha will do clean the skin around the knee and administer a local anesthetic. The doctor will then proceed to insert a needle in your joint and inject the medications.

Sometimes, the doctor might remove fluid from the knee joint to ease the pressure. The doctor can use the puncture wound to administer medications and finally place a dressing over the injection site.

Recovery After Knee Injections

After getting knee joint injections to treat osteoarthritis, you can go home with ease. For fast recovery after getting injections to treat osteoarthritis on your knee at Crosspoint medical clinic, we recommend the following:

Avoid strenuous activity and playing sports
Cover the injection wound to prevent infections
Monitor any allergic reactions after the injection, such as swelling
Use any oral or topical medications as prescribes by your doctor

If you experience any complications after knee injection treatments, you should contact your doctor for emergency medical care. One injection might provide pain relief for up to six months. Therefore, you will require more knee injection treatments.