Don’t Forget Dengue!
As if we didn’t have enough to worry about right now with COVID-19, the number of dengue fever cases is up here in Singapore. The flu-like illness isn’t contagious from person to person; rather, it’s transmitted through the bite of an Aedes mosquito that has bitten an already infected person. Symptoms to look out for include a sudden high fever, chills, severe headaches, pain behind the eyes, fatigue, joint and muscle pain, nausea and vomiting, severe abdominal pain, bleeding gums, and a rash on the skin that appears two to five days after the fever.
Our knees are like the wheels of a car. The smooth cartilage lining of the knee is like a rubber tyre on a wheel. Through the passage of time, car tyres, like knee cartilage, can wear out and need replacing. Unlike other body parts, cartilage doesn’t contain blood vessels and doesn’t heal easily when injured. Once it’s worn out, this is called osteoarthritis.
Genetics plays a key part in around half of all knee osteoarthritis cases. However, there are other causes as well. Athletes who damage their meniscus, cartilage or anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in the knee are at much greater risk of developing osteoarthritis later in life. Avoiding injury is therefore key to preventing osteoarthritis. Undergoing an injury prevention programme, strength training and physiotherapy may reduce knee injuries in athletes.
Additionally, obesity puts you at greater risk of developing knee osteoarthritis. The good news is that if you can lose weight, you can improve your knee pain and function significantly. Personally, I recommend my patients with osteoarthritis to perform low-impact exercises like brisk walking, swimming or cycling, as pain allows.
In addition to injury prevention and exercise, antiinflammatory medications, and supplements such as glucosamine and chondroitin can help in the short term. A cortisone and “lubricant” (hyaluronic acid) injection can also be extremely helpful with knee pain due to osteoarthritis. If your knee osteoarthritis is severe, you may be a candidate for partial or total robotic knee replacement, or joint sparing knee re-alignment surgery.