At Stone Clinic we’re often asked, “What can I do to preserve my knees?” The answer: don’t get hurt. Knees can go forever, providing their cartilage and ligaments stay intact. “But how do I not get hurt?”

Which are you: a statistic or a person with a problem? If you ask the government, or many of the “managed” health care plans, you are seen as a “life”—as in, how many “lives” will be treated and at what cost? If you ask a doctor who has your best interests at heart, you are a person. But if he or she says they must follow a guideline for your arthritis care, walk out. Here is why.

The choice to operate—or not to operate—is a daily decision that all surgeons go through and that all injured patients face. At times, operative care can actually be more conservative than non-operative care, notably in cases where the injury is only going to get worse. Here are some of the typical choices our patients will face during this upcoming ski and winter sports season.

“Doc, my knee popped, it now catches and gives way.” Whether it is the knee, the ankle, the hip, or the shoulder, catching and giving way—especially after hearing a pop—is bad news.

Arthritis is preventable. Yet until recently most people thought it was inevitable. Here are some examples of how to best treat your injured knee.

Looking up the symptoms of your illness online and learn to be proactive about your doctor and treatment options.

You are told you have knee arthritis. The advice the doctor gives you is to go home, rest your knee, take anti-inflammatory drugs, lose some weight, wait until you are older and then get an artificial knee replacement. This advice is awful. Here's why.

Losing a meniscus is tough on the body. Without a meniscus, the covering of each of the bones, called the articular cartilage, rub up against one another, which leads to pain and, eventually arthritis. Patients often ask me "Isn't there a shock absorber you can put back into the knee joint?"