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Knee Injury Bible
From prominent experts in orthopedics and sports medicine, a comprehensive guide for anyone with knee injury or chronic knee pain: how injuries occur, how to treat problems, and how to return to the life and sports you love
Knee pain and knee injury happen to people at any age and across all walks of life. And they are very common: more than 1 million people underwent arthroscopic knee surgery last year. It can be confusing to navigate the many different treatment options, and surgery and physical therapy are taxing processes on many levels. In The Knee Injury Bible, some of the country's foremost experts on orthopedics and sports medicine combine their expertise to share a definitive resource for patients. In clear, readily understandable language, the authors cover:
types of injuries and pain, and how they happen
which tests are necessary and which are not
what to ask at doctor visits
what to expect when undergoing surgery
basic physical therapy exercises
healthy eating during the recovery period
how to set expectations and return to the activities and sports you love
Chapters also include inspiring stories from other patients and prominent athletes to show readers that they are not alone -- and they can recover and live normally again.
Knee pain and knee injury happen to people at any age and across all walks of life. And they are very common: more than 1 million people underwent arthroscopic knee surgery last year. It can be confusing to navigate the many different treatment options, and surgery and physical therapy are taxing processes on many levels. In The Knee Injury Bible, some of the country's foremost experts on orthopedics and sports medicine combine their expertise to share a definitive resource for patients. In clear, readily understandable language, the authors cover:
types of injuries and pain, and how they happen
which tests are necessary and which are not
what to ask at doctor visits
what to expect when undergoing surgery
basic physical therapy exercises
healthy eating during the recovery period
how to set expectations and return to the activities and sports you love
Chapters also include inspiring stories from other patients and prominent athletes to show readers that they are not alone -- and they can recover and live normally again.
- GenresNonfiction
383 pages, Paperback
Published October 1, 2019
15 people are currently reading
24 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
March 9, 2020
I have had intermittent knee pain since my early 30’s, and I happened to be suffering from a pain bout when I saw The Knee Injury Bible on the New Acquisitions shelf at my library. I’m as surprised as you are that I read the whole thing.
The one time I talked to a general practitioner about my knee problem, he first questioned me about my exercise habits (high impact aerobics 4 times a week through most of my 20’s, ulp). Then he felt around the knee briefly, and diagnosed it as chondromalacia—deterioration of the cartilage under my kneecap. He counseled rest, ice, and elevation till the pain subsided, quadriceps strengthening exercises, and keeping my activities low impact from then on. Although these interventions did help, they were a bummer (especially the “no jumping” part). And as a distrustful sort, I always wondered if he was really correct in his diagnosis.
After reading this book, and in particular the chapter The Top Twenty-Five Knee Problems, I finally concede the point to that long-ago GP. It turns out chondromalacia is a fancy term for “early onset arthritis,” and osteoarthritis itself, anywhere in the body, is caused by cartilage deterioration—I did not know that! I guess I am lucky that my pain is still intermittent and manageable, because once the problem gets intolerable, your main options are to treat the symptoms with injections of various kinds, or have a knee replacement.
As a person with a piddly little chondromalacia issue, only about 30% of the book’s content is directly applicable to me. The bulk of the content is directed toward people who have scary debilitating knee injuries and may need surgery. There are chapters to help you decide if you should have surgery, help you get prepared in the weeks before a surgery, know what to expect on surgery day, and deal with the post-operative hell of physical therapy and waiting for the fricking knee to heal. It can take months and months to recover!
Non- and post-surgical topics covered include types of knee braces and in what situations they are used, injections for pain relief, the benefits of weight loss (each extra 2.2 lbs of body weight add two to six Newtons of force to the knee as it lifts and bears a person around), and ways to prevent reinjury. Strengthening exercise routines are included. I was interested to read that whole knee injury prevention training programs have been developed for high-risk athletes based on biomechanics studies, with impressive results.
All that sounds pretty good, why only 4 stars? There were a few minor annoyances related to accuracy. For instance, The Knee Injury Bible implies that a reader can easily access the injury prevention training programs mentioned in the paragraph above at harmoknee.com and fifa.com and use those exercises for warm-ups. But the first website reveals HarmoKnee is a company your team has to hire; they aren’t giving out their injury prevention plans for free. And FIFA has buried any information about their 11+ warm-up plan deep in the bowels of their website. Even worse, the site links that are supposed to take you to the actual exercises all lead to a page saying, “This website has been deleted.” The exercises are still available from third party sites like this one, though, if you want them: https://www.wakemed.org/ncfc-improve-.... Thanks, authors, for not doing that legwork for me.
Another perplexing lapse is the authors’ declaration on page 245 that “There are three main types of brace that can be used,” while the accompanying chart shows a FOURTH type, not discussed in the text, called the “unloader” brace. You have to go to the index (look under B for brace, not U for unloader!) and then back to page 139 to remind yourself what's up with this type of brace. Once again the reader has to do some work in order to understand the chart fully.
This one is on me, but I kept getting a little hung up throughout the text by the repeated mention of the irreversibility of cartilage damage and lack of a cure, since a knee replacement had previously been presented as a treatment. Going back over it, I see that they mean cartilage can never regenerate itself, and a knee replacement would just be a poor substitute for your original fantastic stuff (as well as also being destined to wear out): hence not a true reversal of the problem. Maybe they could have made that distinction more forcefully, though, to make it absolutely clear to their more careless readers.
Finally, I could have done without the periodic pop culture references to Star Wars, The Karate Kid, The 40-Year Old Virgin, etc. Are these in here because a large percentage of knee injury sufferers are high school and college students? Whatever, they're cheesy and unfunny.
Niggling beefs behind, I bet if I ever get around to purchasing this book, it will become one of the most frequently referenced items in my library. The anatomic drawings are great and the information seems up-to-date. Although I’m sure a lot of this advice is given to patients by their own doctors, it’s nice to have a comprehensive reference text that can address any gaps. Overall I think this book gets the job done pretty well.
The one time I talked to a general practitioner about my knee problem, he first questioned me about my exercise habits (high impact aerobics 4 times a week through most of my 20’s, ulp). Then he felt around the knee briefly, and diagnosed it as chondromalacia—deterioration of the cartilage under my kneecap. He counseled rest, ice, and elevation till the pain subsided, quadriceps strengthening exercises, and keeping my activities low impact from then on. Although these interventions did help, they were a bummer (especially the “no jumping” part). And as a distrustful sort, I always wondered if he was really correct in his diagnosis.
After reading this book, and in particular the chapter The Top Twenty-Five Knee Problems, I finally concede the point to that long-ago GP. It turns out chondromalacia is a fancy term for “early onset arthritis,” and osteoarthritis itself, anywhere in the body, is caused by cartilage deterioration—I did not know that! I guess I am lucky that my pain is still intermittent and manageable, because once the problem gets intolerable, your main options are to treat the symptoms with injections of various kinds, or have a knee replacement.
As a person with a piddly little chondromalacia issue, only about 30% of the book’s content is directly applicable to me. The bulk of the content is directed toward people who have scary debilitating knee injuries and may need surgery. There are chapters to help you decide if you should have surgery, help you get prepared in the weeks before a surgery, know what to expect on surgery day, and deal with the post-operative hell of physical therapy and waiting for the fricking knee to heal. It can take months and months to recover!
Non- and post-surgical topics covered include types of knee braces and in what situations they are used, injections for pain relief, the benefits of weight loss (each extra 2.2 lbs of body weight add two to six Newtons of force to the knee as it lifts and bears a person around), and ways to prevent reinjury. Strengthening exercise routines are included. I was interested to read that whole knee injury prevention training programs have been developed for high-risk athletes based on biomechanics studies, with impressive results.
All that sounds pretty good, why only 4 stars? There were a few minor annoyances related to accuracy. For instance, The Knee Injury Bible implies that a reader can easily access the injury prevention training programs mentioned in the paragraph above at harmoknee.com and fifa.com and use those exercises for warm-ups. But the first website reveals HarmoKnee is a company your team has to hire; they aren’t giving out their injury prevention plans for free. And FIFA has buried any information about their 11+ warm-up plan deep in the bowels of their website. Even worse, the site links that are supposed to take you to the actual exercises all lead to a page saying, “This website has been deleted.” The exercises are still available from third party sites like this one, though, if you want them: https://www.wakemed.org/ncfc-improve-.... Thanks, authors, for not doing that legwork for me.
Another perplexing lapse is the authors’ declaration on page 245 that “There are three main types of brace that can be used,” while the accompanying chart shows a FOURTH type, not discussed in the text, called the “unloader” brace. You have to go to the index (look under B for brace, not U for unloader!) and then back to page 139 to remind yourself what's up with this type of brace. Once again the reader has to do some work in order to understand the chart fully.
This one is on me, but I kept getting a little hung up throughout the text by the repeated mention of the irreversibility of cartilage damage and lack of a cure, since a knee replacement had previously been presented as a treatment. Going back over it, I see that they mean cartilage can never regenerate itself, and a knee replacement would just be a poor substitute for your original fantastic stuff (as well as also being destined to wear out): hence not a true reversal of the problem. Maybe they could have made that distinction more forcefully, though, to make it absolutely clear to their more careless readers.
Finally, I could have done without the periodic pop culture references to Star Wars, The Karate Kid, The 40-Year Old Virgin, etc. Are these in here because a large percentage of knee injury sufferers are high school and college students? Whatever, they're cheesy and unfunny.
Niggling beefs behind, I bet if I ever get around to purchasing this book, it will become one of the most frequently referenced items in my library. The anatomic drawings are great and the information seems up-to-date. Although I’m sure a lot of this advice is given to patients by their own doctors, it’s nice to have a comprehensive reference text that can address any gaps. Overall I think this book gets the job done pretty well.
April 19, 2021
NOTE: I am the author, Nick Kennedy's little sister. But that should give you more trust because I've been making fun of him my whole life, so you know I’ll be honest.
TLDR: For anyone coming off of a recent knee injury, an old injury, or even just wondering how to take better care of their knee, this is an incredible resource. This book is filled with humor, helpful tips, movie quotes, medical jargon turned into normal people speak, and generally anything you could ever want to know about getting back to fighting shape while your knee is taking a little vacation. I loved it, and highly recommend it for anyone dealing with knee issues, looking for a knee community, or just looking to learn more about their friend, the knee.
Long version: I am a two-time knee injury survivor. I first tore my ACL and meniscus while a senior in high school, playing soccer. I had ACL reconstruction and meniscus repair surgery and soon enough, was back on my feet, and back playing soccer a year later.
A few years later, Nick (one of the authors) himself blew out his knee. Soon, he was eating his own "words of wisdom" (his words, not mine) that he used to share with me as I was recovering, realizing that recovering from a knee injury was more complex, difficult, and mentally exhausting that he realized. And so, with this wealth of new information as both a patient and someone becoming a doctor, he decided to write a book about it to bring more insights to the good people who weren't medical professionals: muggles, like you and me.
As for me? For ten years, I lived a care-free! Fun! Play-time life! Then, in August 2019, I was playing in a corporate soccer league against dudes who embodied the word "lacrosse" (if you know what I mean). I decided to give one a taste of his own medicine and, casually, ran into him. Karma was swift as I got up, realizing that my knee was, in fact, injured again. Two months later, in October, I had my second ACL reconstruction and meniscus repair surgery.
The irony is not lost on me that as I went through another surgery for a knee injury, my older brother was publishing a guide for knee injuries.
This book is filled with humor, helpful tips, movie quotes, medical information, and generally anything you could ever want to know about getting back to fighting shape while your knee is taking a little vacation. I loved it, and highly recommend it for anyone dealing with knee issues, looking for a knee community, or just looking to learn more about their friend, the knee.
*Also recommended by Harold, my right knee, who has made life interesting with multiple injuries.
TLDR: For anyone coming off of a recent knee injury, an old injury, or even just wondering how to take better care of their knee, this is an incredible resource. This book is filled with humor, helpful tips, movie quotes, medical jargon turned into normal people speak, and generally anything you could ever want to know about getting back to fighting shape while your knee is taking a little vacation. I loved it, and highly recommend it for anyone dealing with knee issues, looking for a knee community, or just looking to learn more about their friend, the knee.
Long version: I am a two-time knee injury survivor. I first tore my ACL and meniscus while a senior in high school, playing soccer. I had ACL reconstruction and meniscus repair surgery and soon enough, was back on my feet, and back playing soccer a year later.
A few years later, Nick (one of the authors) himself blew out his knee. Soon, he was eating his own "words of wisdom" (his words, not mine) that he used to share with me as I was recovering, realizing that recovering from a knee injury was more complex, difficult, and mentally exhausting that he realized. And so, with this wealth of new information as both a patient and someone becoming a doctor, he decided to write a book about it to bring more insights to the good people who weren't medical professionals: muggles, like you and me.
As for me? For ten years, I lived a care-free! Fun! Play-time life! Then, in August 2019, I was playing in a corporate soccer league against dudes who embodied the word "lacrosse" (if you know what I mean). I decided to give one a taste of his own medicine and, casually, ran into him. Karma was swift as I got up, realizing that my knee was, in fact, injured again. Two months later, in October, I had my second ACL reconstruction and meniscus repair surgery.
The irony is not lost on me that as I went through another surgery for a knee injury, my older brother was publishing a guide for knee injuries.
This book is filled with humor, helpful tips, movie quotes, medical information, and generally anything you could ever want to know about getting back to fighting shape while your knee is taking a little vacation. I loved it, and highly recommend it for anyone dealing with knee issues, looking for a knee community, or just looking to learn more about their friend, the knee.
*Also recommended by Harold, my right knee, who has made life interesting with multiple injuries.
April 11, 2020
This book was a great review for me, just finishing PT school. I would recommend/loan this book to patients to further understand their knee injury. The author does a great job explaining everything in simple terms while making you feel empowered about understanding your injury.
July 3, 2025
There's some really good information, but it's focused on major injuries where you're probably already talking to a doctor. Significant portions of the book are dedicated to surgery. There are some good rehab exercises, but not as many as I expected.
October 5, 2021
The book has lots of conditions of the knee and talks about them, but not in enough detail.
February 1, 2022
It was easy for me to read and understand. The future knee surgery is less scary.
April 13, 2022
LaPrade RF ,H指数 99,荣获OREF临床研究奖，被认为是诺贝尔骨科奖 ,其关于膝关节疾病的科普书籍可以读一读。针对一个部位写一种疾病真的很棒。
September 21, 2025
This was a wide spectrum of injuries and gave a summary of each and the universal ways to address them. It was helpful to an extent but not for a “specific” injury.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews