How To Rehab A Torn Pcl Video

While not as serious as an ACL injury, there are some rehab tips needed for the torn PCL. Learn how to rehab a torn PCL in this sports medicine video.

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Back of knee
May develop arthritis
Generally doesn't need surgery
Strengthen quadriceps

About this Author

Russ Paine is a well-known physical therapist with the Roger Clemens Institute at Memorial Hospital. After getting his degree in physical therapy from Texas Women's University, he trained for several years under David Drez, MD, a renowned surgeon and sports medicine specialist. He has been a rehab consultant for the Houston Rockets, Houston Astros and NASA. He has given hundreds of presentations in his career in the US and abroad, and has published many chapters in text books and papers in peer review journals.

RUSS PAINE: Today we're talking about PCL injuries, posterior cruciate ligament injuries, just the opposite of an ACL injury. So if we would look at our model here, Ross, if you look at his leg the way this is injured is if you're foot is point down and you land on the front of your knee--roll over on your back, Ross. So that involves the posterior cruciate ligament injury. This is the front of the knee, this is the ACL. This is the back of the knee, this is the PCL. So when you have a PCL injury, when you see the doctor basically they look and see if the tibia drops back. Now PCL injury is not near as detrimental to your function as in ACL. The ACL is a primary stabilizer of the knee, provides 85% of the stability. PCL is important but it's not going to make your knee give way as much, so end result with PCL injuries that are not operated on is you may develop a little arthritis in your knee. Probably if you're not involved in sports, you probably won't have this ligament fixed but, again, we want to develop a quadriceps dominant knee with a PCL injury, with an ACL injury we want a hamstring dominant knee. So you strengthen the quad, it pulls the tibia anterior where we wanted to take pressure off the PCL injury. So those are just some things we look for in PCL injuries.

How to Rehab a Torn PCL Video

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