Chronic Knee Pain But Normal Mri Posted: 08-30-06 15:51pm
My husband is 25 and has had chronic knee
pain for a little over four years. He was
active duty military and injured his left
knee during basic training. It seemed to
heal well though and didn't give him
problems for a while. He started to have
some knee pain when he was in korea and
ran eight miles daily and climbed
inumerable stairs. After he returned to
the states, it gradually worsened until he
could no longer pass his pt tests. It was
especially difficult since he was a cook
and spent as many as fourteen hours on his
feet. He was passed from doctor to doctor
in the military and since he rarely saw
the same doctor, they never saw him
fequently enough to make a diagnosis. His
doctor recommended a medical discharge but
it was denied and he was sent to iraq.
When his active duty contract expired he
stilled owed the military four more years,
either in the individual ready reserve or
the national guard. He joined the guard
because the recruiter told him he would
probably be sent to iraq again if he
joined the irr. For a while his pain was
better since he wasn't on his feet as
much. Recently it has been getting worse
even though he has a desk job. He is
unable to run or perform other duties in
the guard so they required him to go to
civilian doctor and get recommendations on
what kind of limitations he should have.
He recently got a government job and
finally has health insurance so we had
been talking about taking him to the
doctor anyway. He went to a orthopedic
surgeon, Dr. Beller, and he ordered an
mri. Since Dr. Beller was out of town
after the mri, he picked up the results
himself. Another doctor had written the
mri report and said there was some
abnormal fluid on both of his joints and
that his left knee showed "increased
signal intensity within the mid portion of
the medial meiscus....It cannot be called
a clear cut meniscal tear but it is
statistically more likely to be torn there
because of the segmental changes." we
anxiously waited for his doctor to get
back from vacation to help us understand
what might be going on. In talking to his
mom I discovered that she was diagnosed
with osteoarthritis in junior high and his
nine year old brother has also been
diagnosed with osteoarthritis. He tried
to pop his knee one evening and felt
excruciating pain. He's not a complainer
but he said it felt like he'd broken it
and it was hanging by a thread. We
planned to talk to the doctor about both
of these issues and had many questions.
We waited an hour and a half before he
ever showed up for the appointment and the
nurse told us he had forgotten the
appointment until he called and reminded
him. When he finally arrived, he did not
greet either of us or apologize for being
late for the appointment. He just
said,"your mri shows nothing." we asked
about the abnormal levels of fluid that
the other doctor had written about. Dr
beller said,"there are no abnormal
levels." I asked about the possibility of
meniscus tearing in the future and Dr.
Beller apparently misunderstood me because
he said, "there is no meniscus tear." he
then said,"you should return to the guard
with no physical limitations whatsoever."
I left the room crying because we had put
so much hope towards this appointment.
After I left my husband told me he
said,"okay," and waited for Dr. Beller to
offer any other options or even to at
least offer him pain medication.
Dr beller just said,"okay, that's it,"
and got up and left. The entire time
lasted between three and five minutes.
My husband is still in terrible pain.
It is especially bad in the evenings and
sometimes he takes a wrong step and cries
out. He says he hates being a "coward" in
front of me. He can't even stand up to
shower or brush his teeth and shave
anymore. His walk is a painful limp. I
feel at my wits end. We've talked about
going to another doctor but I don't know
if I can go through it again if the doctor
doesn't believe he's in pain, as
apparently Dr. Beller didn't. I'm not
sure what questions I have. I really just
appreciate if anyone took the time to read
all this. I don't know whether we should
go to another doctor and if so, what kind.
It hurts so much to see my husband in so
much pain and not be able to do anything.