Osteoarthritis is normally found in the elderly due to the degeneration of their health, which might be brought by injuries, accidents, or the reduction of bone mass. Although osteoarthritis is not a critical disease, it does cause pain and annoyance to the elderly as they have to use their legs all day long.The elderly with this disease are mostly tortured by gonalgia. They, therefore, cannot squat; face the difficulty of going up and down stairs/ladders; and can hardly stand up from short-legged seats. These are all the big limitations of the elderly’s ability to use their knees.
Regarding treatments as well as self-care of the elderly with osteoarthritis, physicians usually suggest patients how to take care of themselves correctly in the daily life. For example, avoid bending down or lifting heads if not necessary; be careful of postures when carrying stuffs or when sitting/sleeping; including proper ways to get up from sleep.
The elderly with osteoarthritis can take care of themselvesfollowing the approaches as per below:
– Massage knees with hot press in order to relieve knee pain and to relax muscles around knees.
– Strengthen groins regularly to decrease reaction on knee joints.
– Use knee guards to tighten knee joints. This helps reduce pain well at the initial stage. However, if they are used for along time, amyotrophy will happen to groin muscles for not having been used for a long time. So, patients should exercise their knee muscles, too.
– To have walking sticks as assistants, they must be held at the opposite site of the painful knee. The benefits of walking sticks are that they can alleviate reactions on knee joints and diminish knee pain. For patients with pain of both knees, they might rely on walkers to solve the mentioned dilemmas. This kind of aiding tools can reinforce walking steadiness better than walking sticks.
– Give advice of how to use knee joints appropriately. Avoid bending knees, folding knees, squat, or cross-legged sitting, for instance. Abstain from going up and down stairs as well if not necessary. Those actions boost up pressure in knee joints which accelerate osteoarthritis and raise pain.
Osteoarthritisis a chronicsubverting disease to the elderly. They, therefore, should get counsels as well as guidance from physicians. Recommendations and suitable daily routines should also be presented to patients for their substantial relief of the disease.