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@cookiezz, I'm dealing with a Baker's cyst on my left knee right now too. Luckily physical therapy and doing my daily exercises diligently is helping. but s l o w l y.
I find that improvement came in very teeny tiny steps at first and accompanies by some setbacks. Icing and rest helps most during the setbacks. The exercises I was given didn't only focus on the knee but also my ankle, my hip and lower back. These areas also needed strengthening or management because they were compensating for poor posture due to the pain in my knee. It's all connected, right?
Now after about 8 weeks, I'm feeling a lot better. Not completely healed, but I see significant improvement and can do the things I like to do again. I'm going on a hiking trip in June so that'll be the real test.
I think you're wise to see your doctor to make sure it isn't something else going on and to rule out a meniscus tear or other injury. If Baker's cyst is confirmed, then maybe a check in with the physical therapist to make sure you're doing the exercises correctly and not over doing it.
Replies to "@cookiezz, I'm dealing with a Baker's cyst on my left knee right now too. Luckily physical..."
I’ve had Baker’s cysts behind both of my knees for years, and never any problems. The one in my left knee doesn’t even seem to be there anymore, but the one in my right knee recently started causing me problems. Here’s why: I decided to try to increase my exercise, and know that I’m not a hard-core exerciser to begin with, and so I was doing the treadmill at 3.3 speed on an incline of 4 to 5. The pounding really did a number on my lower right leg and caused a lot of swelling below my knee and a few inches above the ankle. I noticed it when I was at work and my right pant leg felt really tight, so I looked at it in the mirror and it was larger than the other leg by about 30%. I panicked thinking that it was a DVT, but the ultrasound revealed that it was a non-ruptured 2.36 cm Baker’s cyst. Long story short, I’ve never had any pain with this and I’ve been doing physical therapy for about a month. I’m getting better flexibility and the swelling has gone down very slightly, but I’m hoping after another four weeks it’ll start getting back to normal. If not, they told me to see a vascular doctor. It’s just the one leg. Same as Colleen, physical therapy has been an interesting journey in a good way. Apparently, my right hip is very weak and it has been causing me weird balance problems anyway and I attributed it to something neurological, but apparently it is just that I’m weak. So hopefully after a lot of hard work this will all resolve. I hope to give you guys an update in a month or so. So anyone else suffering anything similar regarding the Baker’s cyst, I wish you much success luck and keep up the good work with whatever the doctors are telling you.
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Thank you so much. Your comments about the exercises for your hip, ankle & low back struck me bc I have problems there also. I was only given the heel slide, rising the leg for strengthening the thigh and a cafe stretch. Loved to know about the hip and ankle. Done you or did you have pain in your ankle Thigh, I have a strong throbbing pain from my thigh to my ankle. I’m glad to hear your doing well on your recovery, it is slow , I was worried when I read a few comments of having this for 3 years! This site is awesome it made me realize how important those exercises are. I’ll be glad to go on my walks again. How long did it take you to start walking & hiking? Well thank you for your encouragement.