Bone breaks around the knee :

tp fracture 18 yrs ago,just finding out! - - Posted by grizelda (grizelda), 16 September 2004

how weird is THAT?   so i had a lateral retinacular release in 1985 and six weeks after surgery i fell off my bike and landed on the knee...thought i would die...went immediately to the ER where it was xrayed...no sign of any fractures.....wore an immobilizer for a looooong time....soon after became pregnant, gained forty pounds and had awful pain the whole time...matter of fact,there hasnt been a day without pain in the whole eighteen years.....but i also suffer from chronic pain, spondylosis, arthritis...blah blah blah...and several autoimmune disorders.    arent' i fun?  i had two shoulder surgeries this past year....my knee had ste arted to get really bad the past five years, but i kept putting it on the old back burner...well i can't anymore....saw an ortho doc two days ago and the xray shows that i had a tp fracture!!!!    and the knee is totally whacked and out of line .....he sent me for an MRI last night and i will see him next week for the results...he's pretty sure there's somethingtorn in there....

now here's my concern:    throughout all these years,i've seen several docs about the pain.....two of them  said "oh you have alot of arthritis in there",one said "you have no cartilage left....it's bone hitting bone in there".....now the new doc says "i dont' see much in the way of arthritis and the cartilage looks good"

how can there possibly be so many different "opinions"??    thanks in advance to any and all who care to comment....or who know the answer!!!!!
Posted by sfmama (sfmama), 16 September 2004

i don't have a good answer for you, but just some thoughts.

My tp fracture would not have been seen just from an xray.  i'm very lucky that the urgent care doctor ordered an MRI.  I have a depression fracture, basically a divot at my tibial plateau that was only visible with the CT scan.

As for why so many different diagnoses, without actually cutting you open (I dont' know if you've had arthroscopic surgery or not), it's very hard to see ligament/cartilege damage, even with MRIs, CT scans etc.  So doctors are only half guessing based on your symptoms and the MRI.  But, to give you an idea of how unreliable an MRI is, many doctors don't even bother to order one because it is so expensive and you just don't get that much benefit.  

good luck

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