knees braces?

I have heard alot about wakeboarders developing bad knees and needing braces. I dont have bad knees but sometimes at night my knees will ache very slightly. Question here is... would a knee brace help to prevent knee damage?....in other words will they keep a good knee good so i can still walk when im 50? or are they only good once you have seriously messed up a knee?

Braces do not offer impact resistance but offer stability. when you see boarders wearing them, its because they have either blown a knee or help preventing a blown knee. if your knees are aching at night, you prob are developing tendonitis or synovial fluid from landing hard. For that you can wear knee sleeves or just do some yoga and not go big, but who does that?

Here's a story for you from 5 years ago...
My knee started to click and hurt pretty good. Went to the Dr. and had it checked out, Doc said it was all good. I borrowed my buddy's knee brace just because I didn't want anything to happen.
The first day wearing the brace, on a Tantrum to Blind, I broke my Tibia (lower leg)...this happened bc instead of my knee working right and absorbing the stress, the lower leg took to full brunt...
Moral of the story -don't wear a brace if you don't have to.

^^^^That's consistent with what my Dr. told me after I asked about a knee brace. I sprained my MCL pretty bad this year so I was looking for some added stability.

ok...so i dont think im going to be doing a knee brace... thanks for the warnings.... whats a knee sleeve?

yeah thats true what justin said, dont wear them unless you have too, they will help prevent an acl or mcl pcl blow out because it connects your top and bottome leg together and helps prevent them from rotating or folding in or out but can certainly hurt you if you dont need them. unless u've blown out ur knee before and need them, dont touch them, also knee sleeves are very tight sleeves you pull up and over your knees, there is a little hole in it where your knee cap goes and you can certainly move pretty good but take impact from you knees tremedously. i would invest in some, they are like 10 bucks each.

yea i understand what you are saying justin but randall wears two knee braces just as a precautionary thing and has never blown his knees. the thing with knee braces is if you buy a good one that is made just for you which is costly but effective. what they do is take a mold of you leg and custom make you brace. with this done everything should be perfect your knee can still work right and absorb impact. the brace will keep your knee from hyperextending, which can and will cause tears of ligaments, or buckling which also will cause tears of ligaments. so the moral of the story is to go buy a good knee brace made especially for you and you will be good.

if people who have blown their knees use braces then why havent they had the same thing happen to them that happened to justin? the reason is that they spent their money wisely and got a brace made just for them that will work the way it is supposed to.

Jeremy, the new thing is digital images. I just got a CTI for my "good" knee and they took an entire digital image of my knee and sent it off to CTI for the custom brace. It made my knee look like a cad drawing.

nice technology is a great thing. how much did all of this cost you? cuz i need a new knee brace and it is time to step it up to the cti.

a custom fitted brace from donjoy or bregs which covers acl/pcl/mcl damage costs roughly 580$ each. CTI's are around 290 but you can get them in sizes. if they are custom fit, they will go up considerably.. chances of breaking your leg or hurting yourself wearing them is slim to none, you'd be veeeeery unlucky but if they are just sized ones then you could still hurt yourself because of the fit. randall harris has blown out both of his knees and one more than once, he talks about it in an interview, but some wear for preventative measures. w/e you decide, hope ur wallet runs deep homie.

Sorry Cablero but those prices sound rediculously low. A custom fitted knee brace will require a doctors prescription. After you get the prescription (and pay for the doctor's visit) you need to find a prosthetic clinic which can fit you. Hanger prosthetic is a big company on the west coast (I think). My local Hanger place did CTI's. Some places do only specific companies such as don joy, breg etc. I am willing to bet that ANY custom fitted knee brace will be 1k+. Now if you have insurance they can pay for the bulk of it depending on the terms of your insurance carrier. After my ACL surgery I paid 10% of my knee brace for the operated knee which was approx $150 or $1500 TOTAL. For my other knee I paid closer to $300 since I was below my deductible for "durable hardware" which is the category the knee brace falls into. Regardless each brace was roughly $1500.00...period.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Second that...my CTI was well over $1000.00. My insurance covered most of that though. I've never heard of a custom fitted for under a grand.

my custom fit Breg's were about $1400 each. i paid 20% of that. crappy thing is that for my second one i still hadn't met any of my $450 deductable...so that had to be met first.

cableorwake randall has never blown his knees he said it in an interview with tony smith in the july 2007 issue of alliance wakeboard mag. tony smith asks "you wear two knee braces now, is that from injury?" and randall replies "No, its just preventative. I've never blown out either of my knees. It's all about career longevity at this point ... ridin' till the prop falls off." The rider you are thinking of is probably parks bonifay or maybe keith lyman who has blown both knees each only once. parks has blown both knees as well with i believe his left knee twice and had severe complications with his right knee a few years ago.

Yeah this is helpful. So CTI custom braces work....good to know. That may be what i have to do. However, has anybody started having knee pain at night (and actually as i write this post) and tried going the cheaper route and got some neoprene sleeves? I think i am going to get some but i am worried that they may not be good enough.

Luke, I used to wear a glorified neoprene sleeve that had some straps and was a little bulkier than the regular sleeve. I felt like it did not offer me much support personally. For 10-20 bucks just try them and see what you think. If you are seriously considering full custom braces that would be a drop in the bucket comparatively.

Without getting into the discussion if you should wear them with good knees, I have bledsoe's for my bad knees and would not recommend those. They were custom fitted, but there are too many velcro straps. Once they are wet the velcro does not hold very good and they are always coming loose. I notice the one's Randall wears has way less straps. I would recommend trying on all the models before buying any.

I use a brace called a bella cure (www.bellacure.com). The thing is pretty sweet if you have having impact problems affecting your cartalege (sp?) and meniscus (sp?) because it pulls your knee joint apart to offer relief. what is really sweet about it is that you can adjust how much relief you are getting because it has a BOA system in it. I have been wearing it all summer to ride and the water hasnt affected it at all and the relief is amazing, and its washable. So depending on your problem it might really help, it has me at least. I wear it all day everyday because i am on my feet most of the day and it looks like it is going to save me from surgury. Just my .02

yeah i meant that is the price for the brace, without any fit. My husband plays for nebraska and he actually asked his trainers and they are around a grand each when the are custom measured by an ortho but thats with the university. so they may just cost 1500 for individual purchase..dizzamn.. he's a lineman and they all have to wear them.

And Jeremy, you are right, that is who im thinking of Parks..


(Message edited by tashi_sotiris on September 05, 2008)

Yup my CTI vapor was over 1,000.

I have CTII. Blew my ACL/MCL/PCL/Meniscus in Aug last year. Cost was well over 1k. Thank God for insurance (did I just say that).

I also am not doubting that one of the above posters buddies snapped his tibia, but I am sure that would have happened regardless. Either something more major than an acl to his knee or that. I can't see a custom fitted knee brace causing that. I have all my mobility and the straps are flexible in the event of something serious. In my non DR opionion the brace didn't cause the injury to happen.

Dr's are split and it will depend on who you ask. Each case is different. Most Division I football players especially linemen are offered up a custom one as preventative options to help with longevity. The braces prevent injury not help with pain. They don't help with the pain associated from impacts suffered from landing hard in the flats or arthritis. They keep your knee in alignement to prevent injury. An older buddy of mn who rides rdes with a sleeve. He put an icy hot path under there or uses this stuff called Blue Goo to aid his pain. He's like 45. Works for him.

My Dr said it was up to me. He encouraged me to ditch it after a yr from surgery. I still use it and will til the end of the season. HVEN'T DECIDED IF I WILL KEEP ROCKING IT NEXT YEAR. Dr said knee will be stronger than the original if I keep up rehab. I did take a bad spill or 2 and felt the brace do its job of keeping me together so if you ask me it was worth every penny.

What I didn't know is actually how much your quad keeps you knee from hurtin. Having strong quads leeds to great knees is what has been preached to me along with stretching. You can never do too much.
If it's purely for the pain I think a sleeve or something will keep your muscles tighter and prevent some swelling. Just stretch, warm up, and stretch again. That is best advice.

I guess after all that to answer you question........if you were worried about injury consider a good custom one, but if it for pain Imy experience has been it is zero help. A sleeve would be worth trying.