Running

Pauldfcdarlo

Hello I’m new here.This is my first post. I’ve had osteoarthritis in my knee for about five years (when first diagnosed)

Does anyone still run with osteoarthritis of the knee? I used to enjoy running and it was always good for the mood. I haven’t done it for a while as worried it would further damage my knee or cause a flare up but I would certainly like to try it again. Any tips

Louisa77

Hi @Pauldfcdarlo

Welcome to the online community, really pleased you decided to post.

It's always good to speak to the professionals due to severity of the condition and everyone is different, but on a general position running is often suggested as impacting the joints. Maybe a physio could give you some suggestions of alternatives or say whether you would be ok.

Maybe this will give you some ideas:-

https://www.versusarthritis.org/about-arthritis/exercising-with-arthritis/

Keep us posted

Best wishes

Louisa

jonr

Hi @Pauldfcdarlo,

I ran with OA in both knees until a year ago when it became too painful.

There's no medical link between Running and Arthritis, in fact it's recommended to help strengthen muscle and tendons around joints. The effect on my knees was to slowly erode the cartilage under my knee caps followed by the cartilage between my fibias and tibias so I now have none at all and am in need of a double replacement at age 56.

By contrast, a friend's father is in his 80's and has run marathons regularly for decades with zero problems so I'm thinking it may be genetics.

In short, there's no reason not to run but listen to your body, if you start picking up strains and injuries then perhaps scale it back.