Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Specialist Assoc. Dr. Dilek Eker Büyükşireci said that newly developed interventional treatment options are now much more effective in the treatment of knee arthritis and that satisfactory results are obtained in the treatment of these patients.
Mentioning the existence of new techniques and devices that strengthen the hands of doctors in knee arthritis, Medicana International Samsun Hospital Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Specialist Assoc. Dr. Dilek Eker Büyükşireci said, “Knee arthritis is popularly known as the wear of the cartilage in the knee joint, the loss of fluid in the kneecap or knee joint, or the friction of the bones against each other. Knee arthritis is actually a natural process of aging and wear and tear in the structures that make up the joint. Patients with knee arthritis most often present to us due to knee pain. However, in addition to knee pain, these patients may be accompanied by a crunching or crackling sensation during movement. Again, these patients say that they have difficulty in long walks, climbing stairs and squatting. Recently, we have a device that is part of our examination that strengthens our hands as physical therapists, ultrasonography. In addition to the physical examination, we can evaluate our patients with ultrasonography and determine whether this arthritis is really the cause of knee pain or whether there is another accompanying pathology. Again, we can use this ultrasonography device in the treatment of our knee arthritis patients. Because there are many interventional treatment methods that have recently been developed in this field. In other words, as in all joint problems, ultrasonography both strengthens our diagnosis in knee arthritis and ultrasonography plays an active role for us in treating the direct abnormality, which we call targeted pinpoint treatment.”
New generation interventional applications in knee arthritis treatment
Emphasizing that they can benefit from many new generation applications in the healing of the disease, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Dilek Eker Büyükşireci said, “In addition to the well-known intra-knee hyaluronic acid treatments from the past to the present, we now offer smart plasma applications obtained from the patients' own blood, exosome applications obtained from the umbilical cord of newborn babies in the laboratory environment, and stem cell applications obtained from abdominal fat or bone marrow as treatment options. In the first stage of treatment, we use painkillers, anti-edema medications, supplements, knee braces, physical therapy applications and exercises that support the knee fluid and increase the knee fluid. We definitely support our patients to lose weight. Although there are many new generation treatment options recently used in the treatment of knee arthritis, we want all our patients to lose weight and exercise regularly and apply to physical therapy applications when necessary.”
Underlining that patients should apply to physical therapy and rehabilitation specialists as soon as they feel knee pain before it reaches the last stage, Büyükşireci said, “The most common thing we have seen recently is that our patients unfortunately apply to us when they are candidates for prosthesis surgery, which we call stage-4 arthritis. However, we want our patients to apply to us for treatment at earlier stages so that our results in these new treatment options will be more satisfying and our chances of success will increase. For this reason, I recommend that all our patients with knee pain apply to physical therapy and rehabilitation specialists and be examined.”
