Anterior knee pain may be the result of poor foot mechanics. It can be present inn people of any ages but is more common in young adults who have recently increased their sports activities at school or in adults who have recently joined a gym or sports in order to get fit.
Cause
The condition may be caused by abnormal foot pronation. Pronation results in internal rotation of the leg and may cause a lateral movement of the patella (knee cap). This is referred to as ‘patella maltracking’. This causes a grating affect on the under-side of the knee cap and over a period of time leads to pain and disability. An increase of activity will aggravate the pain and a reduction of activity will improve the pain. Weakness of the medial (inner) part of the quadraceps muscle in the thigh may contribute to the problem.
Treatment
By controlling pronation with orthoses and balancing muscle strength with appropriate exercises results can be very impressive.
