If you’re a basketball player, coach or fan, you’ve likely heard of Jumper’s Knee — a common name for patellar tendinopathy. Jumpers knee is an overuse injury affects the patellar tendon, which connects your patella to your shinbone, and it’s especially prevalent in sports that involve repetitive jumping and explosive movements, like basketball.
Why Does Jumper’s Knee Happen?
Basketball involves explosive jumping, rapid changes of direction, and constant high-impact and often awkward landings. Over time, this places significant strain on the patellar tendon, leading to micro-tears, inflammation, and in some chronic cases tendon degeneration.
Common Signs and Symptoms
- Pain just below the kneecap, especially after jumping or landing
- Stiffness and discomfort at the start of activity, which may improve as you warm up
- Local tenderness to touch at the tendon
- Difficulty with jumping, squatting, kneeling, or sprinting
How Physiotherapy Can Help?
Physiotherapy plays a key role in both recovery and prevention:
- Assessment: We identify contributing factors like poor biomechanics, muscle imbalances, or training load errors.
- Treatment and Rehabilitation: Apply treatment methods to resolve inflammation via taping and Shockwave therapy. Focused loading exercises such as isometric and eccentric strengthening, to rebuild tendon integrity.
- Activity Modification: We help manage training loads to avoid further aggravation and allow for tendon rehabilitation.
- Biomechanics and Technique: Assess and improving jumping and landing mechanics reduces tendon strain.
- Return-to-Sport Planning: Gradual reintroduction of sport-specific drills ensures safe recovery.
- Strength and Conditioning: to ensure that you remain strong enough to withstand the demands of the game and enhance performance.
Don’t Ignore the Pain… Early management is important. Ignoring the signs can lead to chronic issues and long-term time off the court.