In this video I am going to show you proper squatting mechanics if you have knee pain. This technique can be used to prevent stress on your knees and limit the loading.
Tweetables:
Proper Squatting Mechanics for Knee Pain [Click To Tweet]
How to Squat with Knee Pain [Click To Tweet]
Best Way to Eliminate Knee Pain When Squatting [Click To Tweet]
Transcript:
Hey guys, this is Manu Kalia, physical therapist and Ayurveda herbalist. So I wanted to address a common question for those of you having a lot of knee-related problems – chondromalacia patella and patellofemoral problems, and having difficulty with doing a lot of squatting movements. So part of it has to do with the alignment of the knee, the angle at the knee and how much weight that puts on your knee as well as kneecap area.
So what you want to keep in mind is ideally, of course, you want to do your non-weightbearing strengthening first for these kind of conditions and you want to have adequate hip and glute strength before you’re progressing on to squatting and weightbearing exercises. But when you do decide to and you are able to start doing some weightbearing or for function if you want to squat and pick up something, what you want to keep in mind is this. So I’ll do it in the side view so you can get an idea and we’ll use this as an example.
So imagine if there is a stick that’s in line with my ankle that is going straight up. So if I decide to squat and if I bend more at my knee, so if I squat this way so my knee drifts forward, now there’s a lot more load going through this joint, especially that patellofemoral joint. If you had chondromalacia patella, it’s a lot of pressure through that area. So what you want to keep in mind is ideally, as much as possible, I’m not letting that knee go too far forward when you’re doing that squatting movement, whether to pick up something off the ground or for exercise purposes also. So what you want to think about it as is doing more hip flexion, so you’re hinging more at your hip. And you might even bring your feet wider apart, so that way the pelvis can sit back into that position. So when I do hip flexion and I stick my butt back and go back, now the knee doesn’t drift as far forward. So a lot more of the load is on my hands, my glutes and this region as opposed to through the kneecap. So this might be a better position.
So once again, you want to make sure when you’re squatting you stick that bottom back and you’re hinging more at your hip as you come down. And you do strengthening and some quad work or reduce the distance you’re going down, so you could do just partial squat so you get used to firing up these muscles through here without putting too much pressure and load through that kneecap at the knee.
So I hope you found that helpful, and if you have any questions, make sure,leave a comment. Thanks.
