What are your knees trying to tell you?
Written by Dr. Randy Hamling,
Accelerated Chiropractic, Morris
What are your knees trying to tell you before winter?
You already know which chairs are too low. You know which pew at church is going to make you wince when you stand. And you’re already doing the math on winter — the sidewalk, the driveway, the parking lot at the grocery store.
If that sounds familiar, you’re not alone. Knee osteoarthritis affects roughly one in three adults over 60, and for many people the pain isn’t the worst part. It’s the way it quietly rearranges your life. You favor the bad knee without realizing it. Your hip compensates. Your back tightens. Your balance suffers. And when winter arrives, every icy surface becomes a risk you didn’t used to have to think about.
What does “Bone on Bone” really mean?
If you’ve been told you’re bone on bone, you probably heard it as a final answer — surgery or just live with it. But bone on bone describes a spectrum, not a cliff. It means the cartilage cushioning your joint has worn thin enough that bone surfaces are making contact. How much contact, and how the joint responds to treatment, varies widely from person to person.
What many patients never hear is that published research supports several non-surgical approaches for knee osteoarthritis. Joint decompression gently separates the joint surfaces to relieve pressure on damaged cartilage. Class IV laser therapy reduces inflammation at the tissue level without drugs. Targeted manual therapy can restore mechanics that years of compensation have thrown off. And when these approaches are combined, studies consistently show better outcomes than any single treatment alone.
Surgery is the right answer for some patients. But the idea that your only choices are a knee replacement or a lifetime of cortisone shots and anti-inflammatories is not the full picture.
What are the warning signs?
If your knee aches after sitting and loosens up as you move, that’s a hallmark of osteoarthritis — your joint fluid isn’t circulating the way it should. Grinding or popping when you bend usually means cartilage surfaces are wearing unevenly. Swelling after activity, or swelling that appears for no clear reason, signals inflammation the joint can’t resolve on its own.
And if you’ve started avoiding stairs, skipping uneven ground, or thinking about falling more than you used to — those aren’t small things. That’s your body working around a problem that’s getting worse. Cold weather stiffens joints and ice multiplies the risk, which is why October — Bone and Joint Health Awareness Month — is the time to act, not January.
Take the next step
Dr. Randy Hamling and the team at Accelerated Chiropractic in Morris offer a $79 new patient assessment that includes a full functional evaluation and trial treatment for chronic knee pain and osteoarthritis — no injections, surgery, or medication. Call 320-585-7246 or visit acceleratedchiro.com.
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