Understand Your Pain Summary

Only have five minutes to learn about your knee cap pain?

Below is a summary of all of the information contained within the ‘understand your pain’ pages. This information does not replace consultation with a physiotherapist or doctor.

Signs and symptoms:

• Pain around, or behind the patella (knee cap).
• Knee cap pain with knee crepitus (knee crepitus does not indicate that your condition is worse).
• Tenderness on patellar palpation.
• Pain during sitting, or pain when straightening your knee after sitting.
• Mild swelling.

Aggravating factors: 

• Squatting (80% of people with knee cap pain will experience pain during this movement).
• Running.
• Stair ambulation (going up and down stairs).

Associated factors:

• Physical factors- anxiety, depression, fear of movement.
• Altered movement patterns- running, climbing stairs.
• Unaccustomed loading- doing ‘too much too soon’.
• A combination of the above.

Pain monitoring:

• It is common to experience some knee cap pain at the start of treatment.
• Limit pain to less than 2/10 during activities.
• Avoid exceeding 5/10 pain during exercise.
• Monitor pain levels post-exercise (pain levels should return to normal 60 minutes after and should not be increased the following morning post-exercise).

Who is impacted?

• Impacts 11-17% of the general population (adults).
• Impacts 16.5% of runners.
• 2nd most common knee complaint in adolescents
• Women are twice as likely to experience knee cap pain, compared to men.

Expected duration:

• Variable between each person.
• 6/10 people reported favourable outcomes after 1 year.
• 4/10 people reported unfavourable outcomes after 1 year.
• It may be harder to achieve complete recovery if you have had knee cap pain for a longer period of time.

Published November 2023