hey everybody it's Doctor Jo, and today I'm going to show you some physical
therapy stretches for knee pain. so let's get started.
so for knee pain, a lot of times the muscles
that cross the knee joint are the ones that are causing the pain. so your calf
muscles, your quad muscles, your IT band, your hamstrings, and then even your hip
flexors even though it doesn't cross the joint, tend to cause a lot of problems. so
we're gonna stretch all of those out. we're gonna start with the calf. the calf
is a pretty easy one to stretch. you can do it in a whole bunch of different ways.
I'm just gonna show you when you're sitting down. I like to put a little roll
or roll up a towel and put it just underneath the leg so your so your heel
can move because you can do it flat on the ground, but you're gonna get a little
bit better stretch if that heel's not touching because then it gets a little
bit more movement in the ankle. then you're just gonna take a strap or if you
don't have a stretch strap you can use a dog leash. you can use a belt, but you
want it to be something firm. so not the resistive band. something that's not
really gonna give. I like these just because they have the loops in them. so
what you're gonna do is just put it about at the ball of your foot. you don't
want it too low because you're not gonna get a good stretch, and you don't want it
high up on your toes because it might slip off and hit you. so just relax your
leg .you're gonna let the strap do all the work and then you're just gonna pull
your foot towards you this way. and you should feel that stretch in your calf
muscle right in there. and sometimes people feel it right underneath their
knee and that's because those calf muscles, those tendons, cross at that knee
joist. so that's why it's so important to stretch and that's why sometimes people
feel it under their knee versus in here. so with the stretch you want to hold it
for about 30 seconds, and you want it to be slightly uncomfortable but not
painful. you know stretching shouldn't hurt, but it shouldn't really feel good
either, so it's that kind of combination of hurt so good kind of feeling. so then
take a little break and then you're gonna do that a total of three times. so
30 seconds holding that 3 times. but it's really that foot is relaxed. you're not
actively pulling it towards you you're pulling it towards you with the strap. so
then we're gonna go in to a hamstring stretch. and again there's
a whole bunch of ways to stretch the hamstrings, I got a couple other videos
that show different ways to do it, but I like the one lying down because then
your back is supported and you don't have to worry about keeping your back
straight. so what I'm gonna do is just kind of lie down, and I'm gonna take the
strap now and just again put it at my foot, but it doesn't have to be at the
ball of the foot this time. I like to kind of prop up the other side just
because that takes pressure off your back, and then you're just gonna again
relax that leg. the strap is gonna do all the work, and you're just gonna pull your
leg up. try and keep your knee as straight as you can. if you're starting
to do this, then that hamstring is really really tight, then bring it back
down and try and straighten out the knee. you want to keep that knee as straight
as you can, and then just come up as far as you can. if you're having knee pain,
you're probably not going to be able to come up as far as I am, so even if you're
right here that's fine. but again try and hold that stretch for about thirty
seconds. if you want to activate the calf as well, you can pull your toes towards
you, but if you really just want to focus on those hamstrings, just kind of let
that foot relax and use that strap to pull it up. and this time you should kind
of feel that stretch here. again sometimes people feel it in the back of
the knee because those hamstrings cross the knee joint the other way, and the
hamstrings come all the way up and attach up here, so you might feel it here.
you might feel it here, and you might feel it there. so again holding it for 30
seconds, doing it three times. and you can do this a couple of times a day. so then
we're going to do the IT band. so the IT band is the same concept where it comes
all the way up and attaches at the hip up here, and then crosses that knee joint.
so if it's tight, it's putting pressure on that knee joint causing knee pain. so
it's very similar to the hamstring stretch except this time when you come
up, you're keeping that leg straight. now you're just going to go till you feel a
little bit of tension and then you're going to cross it across your body. so
sometimes people like to put the other leg straight out so the knee doesn't get
in the way, and that's okay as long as it's not hurting your back. but again you
want to keep that leg as straight as you can. you don't want that knee to be bend
because then you're not stretching that IT band
anymore. so keeping it straight, and then just drop it across your body until you
feel a stretch through here. sometimes people kind of feel it in the bottom
area there. sometimes people feel it on the outside of the knee, sometimes people
feel it in the middle, so just depending on where your tightness is, that's where
you're going to feel it. and again if this one isn't the best for you I have a
video just for a whole bunch of different IT band stretches, and you can
just find the one that's best for you. you don't have to do a particular you
know one just because I'm doing it, you do the one that feels like you're
getting the best stretch for that. so again 30 seconds three times for that. so
now we're going to go into a quad stretch. I'm going to switch legs because
you're gonna roll over onto your stomach and I just want you to be able to see
what I'm doing here. so this time the strap is going to go
all the way up around the ankle. so you're going to kind of put it here and
and having something that's a little bit longer works best because you want to
kind of wrap it around your shoulder and the reason for that is because you want
the upper part of your body to be pretty relaxed. so you can prop up like this, or
you can lie all the way down because you don't want to end up hurting something
else by doing the stretch. so just take the strap kind of around your shoulder
and start pulling and try and bring your heel towards your bottom as much as you
can. so again if your knee is really hurting you might only be able to get to
here, and that's okay. you don't have to get that heel all the way towards your
bottom, but you want to go as far as you comfortably can until you can tolerate
it, again the stretching should be slightly uncomfortable, but it shouldn't
be so painful that you can't hold it for 30 seconds. so again holding that 30
seconds doing that three times. this time you should feel that stretch in the
front of your leg and again sometimes people feel it at the knee. sometimes people
feel it in the knee joint itself, if you have some tightness in that joint versus
in the muscles, but this is a great stretch for that as well. and then the
last one is going to be for your hip flexors. now the hip flexors don't cross
the knee joint, but a lot of times if they're tight,
you're kind of leaning forward and then you have to kind of bend your knees to
kind of even yourself out, so if they're tight they can cause pain
all the way down the chain. so I think they're really important to stretch out
as well. so again there's a couple ways you can stretch it out. one of my
favorites is kind of getting into a lunge position. make sure that you're
protecting your knee because if you're in the lunge position your knees gonna
be on the floor. so when you come up into the lunge position. make sure to put that
pillow underneath the knee that you're going to be leaning on. so the knee
that's going to be down is going to be the side that you're stretching. then
you're just going to kind of come up into a lunge position. and what you want
to do is keep your upper body upright, so a lot of times people kind of try and
stretch like this, but I'm still not stretching my hip flexor if I'm leaning
forward. so keep your upper body upright and then push your hips forward, and you
should feel a stretch right through there. and that's in that hip flexor
area. so again this stretch is just a 30-second stretch, doing that three times.
so once you get all of those stretched out your knee should feel a little more
loosened up and then some of that pain should get out of there. so those were
your physical therapy stretches for knee pain. I want to give a quick shout out to
my wall of thanks. so I want to thank Jazz C., Andy R., Mark, and Will R. if
you're interested in being on the wall of thanks, make sure you check
out my patreon page by clicking on up there, and don't forget to subscribe by
clicking down there. and remember be safe (keep that knee loose), have fun, and I hope
you feel better soon.