How to Lose Weight With a Knee Injury

Fact: For every extra kilogram you carry, you add seven kilograms of pressure to your knees when you jog!

You may have noticed lately that we’ve been talking a lot about being “Life-Fit”, or in other words having physical health in the areas of weight, strength, flexibility, cardiovascular, motor control and bone density.

This is because all of these areas are important for your overall health and wellbeing.

You might find it strange that physios are now talking more about weight – isn’t that the realm of Nutritionists, the Biggest Loser, and everyone else these days? So just why is that?

If you’re trying to lose weight and suffer from persistent knee injuries, the following information is vital for you to read.

Why physios are jumping on the lose weight band wagon

Here’s why.

Take a look at the list below. You can see that for every extra kilo you are over-weight, the pressure on your Patellofemoral joint or PFJ (where your knee cap joins you knee) goes up by:

• Walking – ½ kg
• Bike Riding – ½ kg
• Going up Stairs – 3.3kgs
• Going down Stairs – 5kgs
• Jogging – 7kgs
• Squatting – 7kgs
• Deep Squatting – 20kgs

Depending on the activity, the pressure on your knees continues to increase. And this is only on your knee joints.

Extra weight has an effect on every other joint in your body as well! Losing weight isn’t just about looking good, it’s about being good to your body.  The more you look after your body, the more time you will have to focus on getting healthy and the less time you’ll spend injured on the sidelines, which can really test your motivation and affect momentum with your exercise regime.

How to lose weight and look after your joints

Hot tip for the year – if you need to lose weight, don’t run! …Yet.

There are many other low impact exercises you can do, such as jump on an exercise bike, it’s far kinder on your knees (by a factor of 14 – see list above!)

You can do heavy weights to burn more calories (under the guidance of a professional), but start with Dead Lifts with a Trap Bar rather than squats. And make sure you look at your diet, there’s not point sweating it out at the gym if your diet isn’t healthy, because you’ll just be spinning your wheels and not getting anywhere (exercise bike joke there everyone).

Of course losing weight isn’t simply about exercise other factors such as your diet, sleeping patterns and amount of stress need to be reviewed.

When can you start to jog?

Once your weight is back in a healthy range, then strap on those runners and take to the tracks.

See a Back In Motion physio for guidance on a holistic exercise program that will be effective and safe for you to get back to health.

There’s no point getting enthused to get yourself fit and healthy and then get injured. Weight loss doesn’t happen on a couch with your knee iced.

Nathan Rickard - Physiotherapist and Practice Director, Back In Motion Hawthorn and Back In Motion Aspendale Gardens

Nathan believes in physical rehabilitation to optimize the mechanics of the body.  This is what gets great results, not just a quick fix.  He is also focused on holistic health and fitness, which not only cures injuries, but prevents future injuries and poor health that is a symptom of our modern “sit down” lives.  More specifically, he has a special interest in: lower back pain, knee and ankle injuries, running and exercise related injuries and running and sports-specific movement analysis.