Can your hip cause your knee pain?

06 Mar Can your hip cause your knee pain?

The muscles around your hip can contribute to knee pain

There is a structure on the side of your thigh called the ITB (iliotibial band) – an important structure that helps with hip and knee stability. It spans the whole length of the lateral thigh and attaches into the knee joint. This structure is made up of connective tissue – it is very firm and fibrous. Plus, it has a lot of pain receptors (which, if you ever rolled out your outer thigh on a foam roller, as you would know!!)

I have created some pictures (thank you to my complete anatomy app) to give you a very clear visual that shows some of the muscles around the hip that attach into the ITB. Tightness or dysfunction in these muscles can create excessive tension in the ITB and hence cause issues around the knee joint. (Because the ITB inserts to the outside of the knee). 

One of the symptoms we treat, for example, is called the ITB friction syndrome (often seen in in distance runners or cyclists). Too much tension through the ITB rubs up against the outside of the thigh bone and causes pain.

Another very common problem we see (and treat very successfully) is the patella syndrome. In this very painful condition, there is an imbalance of the ITB tension from the outside vs. the thigh muscle strength on the inside of your knee joint. The knee cap will be “pulled out” of its ideal track in the joint and this mal-alignment causes knee pain.

Our therapists will always assess (and often treat) the hip muscles when treating knee pain. This is just one example of how important it is to assess and treat other joints that are away from the site of pain. 

Long term, looking at a site of pain holistically (functionally assessing at least the joints above and below a problem area) will always win!

Want to be our next winner? Let us have a look at your knee pain for you!