Knee pain and swelling after total knee replacement

Bones, joints and muscles
1

had surgery three weeks ago,all going well then  developed really bad swelling around joint only.Icing fhelps a little but very fearful something happened!

2

Hi James,  You might want to check it out for peace of mind.  i am on five weeks now though an my one knee and leg is still almost twice the size of the other one, although I had swelling even prior to surgery.  It has gone down some, still pretty big.  My DR and PT told me it was quite normal and may take a couple of months to go down.  Not all of us are the same though.  I wish you the best!

3

Thank you,it helps.I was quite concerned that it became worse after I thought it was getting better.

4

Make sure you elevate the leg just so its above your heart. Remember, you had a tourniquet around the leg for blood control purposes during surgery and that alone can cause pooling of blood in some rather strange ways. Stay off the leg and stick with working on quad strengthening.

5

Don't forget to ice and elevate several times a day.

6

James

Hate to be the Voice of bad news I had both my knees replaced same time and my left kept swelling up twice it's size, I asked my knee surgeon.He kept saying it's normal but it was not normal . I had developed a DVT clot behind my left knee. It called an unprovoked DVT. It's caused by the surgery And the fact that the rehab place decided not to give me a blood thinner my surgeon prescribed. It was a nightmare in my recovery process. So here 11 months post op and im am just done with all the sonagrams and vein stripping. So check it out before it goes to far. If my surgeon had figured it out my life and my recovry would have been so much better.

7

Thanks will follow up

8

Welcome to the group. I'm shari and I had a tkr 4 months ago. It will get better, I had swelling from day one. One thing is ice ice and more ice this should help. Make sure you do your pt exercises. I will be going back to work the first of January.

9

I would request an appointment just to have it checked out.

,

You may be becoming more active, spending less time with your knee elevated and heavily iced. Even just sitting with your knee down for five minutes can cause a flare.

Remember, you are in a marathon, not a sprint. At this stage, it doe not take much to over do things.

10

If you only had pain after 3 weeks maybe you are lucky. It's a long road, don't be in a hurry

Good healing

11

Three weeks it’s too soon! Keep icing, It probably takes so much more time...

Make sure you do your pt exercises & don’t forget to ice several times a day, ice and more ice this should help.

12

Ice ice and more ice.