A knee injury causes a tear in the meniscus cartilage, causing a meniscal cyst. While meniscal cysts are not significant, they can cause knee pain, swelling, and movement issues.
What are Meniscal Cyst Symptoms?
An injury that causes pain, especially when standing on the leg that is hurt, and knee joint pain
A firm hump at the cyst site, usually on the outside of the knee.
- When the knee is stretched, a cyst may become visible.
- An occasional painless bump
- Knee swelling, joint line discomfort over the meniscus, joint “locking,” or ligament injury may occur.
What Causes Meniscal Cysts?
True cysts are not meniscus cysts. The fluid is displaced joint fluid. Fluid from the joint might gather in a pouch. This is the cyst pouch.
When the knee pad tears the meniscus, fluid may leave the joint and go into a cyst, never to come back. Consequently, the cyst will continue to gather fluid.
Risk factors for meniscal cysts:
- Injury to the knee or meniscus
- Participation in contact sports or knee-twisted sports like football, soccer, rugby, or tennis.
- Growing old or osteoarthritis
- Ligament tears, like the ACL
- Most meniscal cysts occur in 20- to 30-year-old men. They frequently occur with horizontal cleavage meniscus tears.
- Over Rotation of the knee can cause this injury. A direct knee-front or side collision might also cause it. Uneven running might also cause knee injuries.
- Degeneration of the meniscus can create cysts. This frequently indicates osteoarthritis or age.
- Sports that twist and spin can rupture the menisci.
- Previous knee injury
- Injury of the knee, especially ligaments
- Aging increases degenerative meniscus tears.
Treatments of Meniscal Cysts
Meniscal cyst pain can be managed with ice. Anti-inflammatory drugs help too. A pain physician in Dallas may needle-drain the cyst. Unless the meniscal tear is repaired, the cyst will return.
Conservative Meniscal Cysts Treatment
Anti-inflammatories:
- They minimize knee edema and inflammation.
- To minimize knee strain and edema, rest is recommended.
- Frequent icing reduces pain and swelling in the knee.
- Compressing the knee with an elastic bandage reduces edema.
- Elevating the leg minimizes gravity-induced knee swelling.
Cyst aspiration and steroid injection using ultrasound:
- Avoids surgery risks
- High recurrence risk
Surgery
Meniscal tears don’t usually require surgery. They usually undergo minimally invasive arthroscopic surgery. 2 An instrument is introduced through small incisions to operate on the joint. Cysts usually disappear completely after rip healing. Though unlikely, the cyst may reappear.
What Precedes a Torn Meniscus Surgery?
If you and your surgeon of pain management in Dallas decide to repair a torn meniscus, you may undergo testing. Blood tests, EKGs, and chest X-rays can indicate operation readiness. (These tests are normally unnecessary if you’re healthy). Your pain control anesthesia will be determined by the anesthesia team. An injection of local anesthesia makes your knee hurt less. Regional anesthesia numbs the lower body with an injection.
Local or regional anesthesia may sedate you to relax. General anesthesia is usually used for this surgery.
In the days leading up to surgery, your healthcare professional will prescribe pain-management drugs.
Schedule physical therapy or crutch fittings. Help you prepare for surgery. Before the procedure, you may need to discontinue certain medications and fast for several hours.
Arthroscopic Meniscus Surgery
The most usual way to fix a torn meniscus is with knee arthroscopy. It normally takes under an hour.
You get anesthesia first. The surgical team cleans your knee and drapes your leg. The team may clamp your upper thigh for operation positioning.
Your knee surgeon produces portals and little stab cuts. The team then fills the knee with sterile fluid. The fluid controls minor joint bleeding and wipes away debris, helping the surgeon look within. Arthroscopes are inserted into incisions by surgeons. A thin tube with light and a video camera at the end is an arthroscope. The camera displays knee-inside video on a monitor.
The surgeon uses the arthroscope to assess the tear and choose a surgical method. To allow cartilage to mend, the surgeon sews torn meniscus pieces together. Repairable tears are fewer than 10% due to tear type and blood supply.
Partial Meniscectomy
The surgeon removes diseased cartilage but leaves healthy meniscus tissue. Your surgeon inserts other surgical tools based on technique. Surgical strips or stitches close the apertures after a meniscectomy or meniscus repair.
Diagnosis for Meniscal Cysts
For diagnosing meniscal cysts, magnetic resonance imaging is the best. Meniscal cysts are small, localized areas with a lot of signal strength in swollen meniuses. The signal strength of T2-weighted sequences is smaller than that of fluid, so radiologists often miss this type of meniscal cyst. The swollen meniscus goes back to normal when this fluid is pushed into the nearby soft tissues. The fluid has a stronger T2 signal than parameniscal cysts.
A meniscal cyst forms from a straight tear in the medial meniscus. A middle meniscus horizontal tear and cyst can be seen on sagittal T2.
Conclusion
Meniscal cysts are masses of synovial fluid in or near the meniscus. They are usually caused by tears in the meniscus. Knee MRIs confirm the diagnosis.
NSAIDs and physical therapy are nonoperative treatments. For persistently symptomatic individuals who fail conservative therapy, surgical decompression with partial meniscectomy or meniscus repair may be recommended.
