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Scar tissue after knee replacement

Joint Replacements | Last Active: Apr 22 9:03am | Replies (1521)

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@krenn

Chris,
Thank you for the information. I am afraid I do not know really much about Myofascial Release Therapy. What do you mean by "It took about six weeks to get the restrictive fascia and scar tissue released and then it was over"? Do you mean that the therapist was able to correct your issue and pain? At my initial PT after my TKR, I left therapy with flexion of 116... I have now regressed to 82... with extreme pushing and pain they can get me to 95 but it regresses back to 82 to 90. Its stuck!! and in so much pain daily. I just want to be out of pain daily. I have shed so many tears. I feel hopeless.

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Replies to "Chris, Thank you for the information. I am afraid I do not know really much about..."

@krenn I think I can explain a bit how MFR works. Imagine that your leg is bound up in so many rubber bands that it is really hard for you to move and walk and the bands also connect up through your hips and back. There are layers on top of layers and it all wraps around your replaced knee joint too. What if you could stretch those rubber bands so they will allow you to move without cutting them?

Think about your habits like always sleeping in the same position, or posture. Are you a person with perfect posture all the time? How flexible are you? We all have habits, and if we don't stretch and move, our bodies can get stuck in positions of what we do all the time.

Fascia is like interconnecting cobwebs that stretch except that they also get tied up in knots and kinked, dehydrated, and then start pulling and putting a lot of pressure on the body. This fascia weaves through the muscles and organs. It is part of connective tissue that holds everything together. The video Chris shared shows how living fascia unwinds and reorganizes itself. It lengthens and changes state between being a semisolid and a liquid and then back to a semisolid again. That is what happens when you apply a gentle stretch and just hold it, and give the tissue time to respond. If you stretch too forcibly, the fascia can tear, and create scar tissue within it making things worse. Have you removed the skin from a raw piece of chicken and seen the cobweb stuff under the skin? That is non living fascia. It is a bit stretchy, but in life it can expand so much more than what you see there. Watch the video and you'll see. You can skip the first part and get to where you see the video like the still photo displayed on the video link.

Releasing fascia restrictions lets the body move better, allows body fluids to enter, and can reduce pain a lot actually, if tight tissue is the cause of that pain. It takes patience and working with the right therapist who has been trained in the John Barns methods. Surgery creates scar tissue, and myofascial release can mitigate that. I had a great recovery from spine surgery because I was doing MFR before and after the surgery, and Chris has a similar success with her knee replacement and she had a better recovery for the second one because of MFR. MFR shouldn't be painful. It feels like a yoga stretch that you just hold for awhile and wait.

This member @golfshrink also describes a similar situation of struggling after knee replacement and that MFR was the solution.
https://connect.mayoclinic.org/comment/247122/

Here is a link to a short article written by John Barnes explaining how fascia works as a lever.
https://myofascialrelease.com/downloads/articles/FasciaAsALever.pdf

I helped Chris discover myofascial release and at the beginning, she didn't understand why it helped, but she tried it and was patient, and it gave her back mobility. @artscaping, Chris can tell you how much it helped her. I was lucky to find an expert level trained therapist ten years ago who has helped me and taught me how all of this works. MFR has done a lot for me as well. There is an MFR provider search at http://mfrtherapists.com/

Do you have any questions about myofascial release?

Good evening @krenn........sorry for being a little late getting back to you. I have surgery scheduled next week and the last couple of days have been all those supportive appointments.

Yes, @krenn, I do mean that the MFR therapist was able to correct the issue completely in six weeks and it has never returned. What we did with the second TKR was to have the PT at the clinic talk with my MFR therapist so that they were working together. I even scheduled the appointments back to back. PT first and then MFR. I had no scar tissue problems with this joint replacement.

Eliminating the scar tissue made it easier to achieve the flexion goal. It seems you are having a bit of regression with that mobility issue......as you say...."its stuck". I sort of forced my way through this "flex test" until I got to 137. Now I just have to maintain it.

I am so sorry that you are in constant pain. Are you using lots of ice and elevating your leg above your heart? Just so you have the latest information about MFR and how it can help, I am going to introduce you to @jenniferhunter. She and I rate MFR quite highly. Let's see what Jennifer has to contribute.

Hang in there........we are here for you.
Chris