It is common to hear that someone has a problem with his knee, familiar with terms such as sprains, cruciate ligament tears, meniscal injuries or osteoarthritis, but not always know which anatomical structure referred to the injury.

Anatomy of the knee

Here in general such as the knee joint, the largest of all the joints of the body. It connects the thigh and leg can be divided into two halves, an upper half, or femoral meniscal proximal and lower distal or meniscotibial.

They are part of this joint the distal femur, proximal tibia and patella. These bones are associated in close contact with each other. To ensure that contact between the surfaces produces a subtle movement and pain in the knee joint, like all the joint surfaces in the body, they use a very soft, whitish hyaline cartilage layer.

The distal femur consists of both femoral condyles, which are convex; This means that there are two species of balls or circles that articulate with the tibia. Specifically articulate with the top of the tibia is the tibial plateau, an area much more flattened. Even in some parts is not only flat but has a curvature opposite to that of the femoral condyles. This makes the end of the femur and tibia are original in many different ways that do not fit together. It is said, therefore, are inconsistent.

The rings of fibrocartilage menisci are wedge-shaped, have a concave top surface which is adapted to the convexity of the femoral condyles, and a flat underside that contacts the tibial plateau. They are also responsible for adding joint stability by controlling the lateral sliding of the condyles and body weight evenly transmitted to the tibia.

The ligaments are responsible for preventing the joint to move beyond the normal limits, and are hurt if they exceed the joint range of motion allowed. In addition, the ligaments leading the way in which the joint can move. Therefore, take care to allow greater mobility without compromising joint stability.

In the knee there are four of these structures. The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) prevents the tibia from sliding too far out on the femur, the posterior cruciate ligament (PCL), jugal ligament or transverse ligament, which connects the meniscus in his front side, the ligament of Humphrey or meniscus-femoral-anterior, and Wrisberg ligament or meniscus-femoral.

In addition, the joint has many more elements: joint capsule covering the joint and is reinforced by ligaments, articular cartilage, which favors the reduction of friction between the articular surfaces and reduce the compression forces suffered the joint, wears and degenerates in cases of osteoarthritis, synovial fluid that lubricates the joint.

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