Torn ACL symptoms are usually the same for everyone who has this type of injury.

There are times when not everyone has every symptom of an ACL injury and there are even rare occasions when someone has little to no symptoms of an ACL injury.

The main thing to remember is that if you are involved in an accident or do anything to cause trauma to the knee, you need to have the knee checked out by a doctor.

What you think maybe just a normal bruise or sore feeling from falling down or being involved in some sort of accident, could actually be a more serious ACL knee injury that needs to be repaired imm

Almost everyone has swelling when they have an ACL injury.

Because of the nature of the ACL joint, when it is injured, it will cause the entire knee to swell rather largely and rather rapidly.

Usually, if you notice any swelling to your knee within five to ten minutes of your accident, that means you have injured your ACL and you need to seek medical treatment immediately before you further damage your knee.

Of course, there are times when an injured ACL does not cause swelling, but those times are very rare.

Pain is next on the list of torn ACL symptoms. A person with an ACL injury almost always has incredible pain with it.

There are very few exceptions when the person experiences no pain with the injury, but it has happened before.

Usually the pain will be incredibly severe, but it can also be mild.

Torn ACL Symptoms – Maybe Something More Serious

Again, people can mistake the pain for just being from the accident or trauma to the knee, but it is an indicator that something more serious happened and you should always seek medical treatment if you have pain along with swelling to your injured knee.

The last thing of the torn ACL symptoms that you may notice is that your knee is unstable.

If the pain and the swelling either do not clue you in or you are one of those rare people who do not have one of those symptoms (or even either of them at all), then the fact that you cannot rely on the stability of your knee should alert you to an ACL injury.

The purpose of the ACL is to keep the femur from rotating on the shin bone.

When the ACL is torn, it cannot stop this from happening so the knee will rotate in an awkward way and cause you to fall.

So, if you have all three of these symptoms, or even just one of them, and you recently fell or injured your knee in any way, you should seek medical treatment as it is most likely a torn ACL.

An anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury is a serious condition.

Without seeking proper treatment for the injury, it can cause extensive knee and muscle damage that requires major surgeries to correct.

It is important to know what exactly the ACL does in order to better understand why you need to seek medical treatment if you have an ACL knee injury.

The ACL serves as a barrier between your thigh bone and your shin bone.

It stops them from rotating onto each other. When they rotate onto each other, it causes your knee to wobble from side to side and can cause you to be unbalanced.

There are basic symptoms that should alert you if you have an ACL knee injury.

Those symptoms include pain, swelling and knee instability. Swelling is the most common symptom and it usually occurs about five minutes after the injury happens.

Pain is sometimes not present at the onset of the injury, but almost always occurs the longer the injury is left without treatment.

The pain with a torn ACL is different depending on the person, but it is usually very severe in nature.

Knee instability means that your knee gives out regularly while walking or even standing.

ACL Knee Injury – The Next Step

This symptoms is more annoying than anything, but should still be checked out by a doctor.

Once it is established that you have an ACL knee injury, your doctor will refer you to a surgeon who will perform an outpatient surgery on your knee.

The surgery entails getting rid of the remaining ligament on the knee and replacing it with other muscle tissue.

The surgery is minimally invasive and you will be home by the afternoon in most cases.

The recovery period after surgery, however, is rather lengthy. You are looking at a minimum of four months of not doing your regular activities.

In many cases, it takes up to six months before you can start fully participating in sports again.

It is imperative to get the okay of your doctors before going back to sport activities again so you do not run the risk of re-injury.

After you have had one torn ACL, you are going to want to be extra careful not to get another one.

Remember to take it slowly when you first get back to your regular activities and slowly work your way up to your normal level.

If you remember to do this and to incorporate warm-up exercises and wear a knee brace, then you should not get another ACL knee injury.

ACL tear symptoms are all pretty much the same from case to case and they are pretty reliable.

On occasion, there will be someone who does not have all of the symptoms or may not even have any of the symptoms, but those occasions are extremely rare.

Most people do not know the symptoms of an ACL injury so, what they think is an innocent pain from maybe twisting their knee or being involved in an accident, is actually a very serious ACL injury that needs to be looked at and evaluated by a knee surgeon.

Swelling is probably the most common out of all the ACL tear symptoms.

If you injure your ACL, you will more than likely notice substantial swelling very quickly after the injury takes place.

The swelling will occur usually by about ten minutes after the injury so, if you have intense swelling, you will need to go to the emergency room and have your knee checked out in order to avoid any other damage to your knee.

There have been occasions when a person with a torn ACL did not have any swelling, but this is rare because of where the ACL is located.

Another of the ACL tear symptoms is pain. Most of the time, a person with a torn ACL will have extremely severe knee pain along with the swelling.

Rarely, if ever, does a person with an ACL injury have no pain at all.

A lot of times, a person will just attribute the knee pain to the accident or fall itself and not to an ACL injury.

ACL Tear Symptoms – Always See A Doctor

It is very important that if you have traumatized your knee in any way that you seek medical treatment if there is pain present.

This usually means there is a tear in the ACL and it needs to be repaired as soon as possible in order for you to prevent further knee damage that requires extensive surgery.

The last main thing with ACL tear symptoms is that you will notice your knee is not as stable as it usually is.

The ACL is a ligament that keeps your thigh bone from rotating on your shin bone.

When you have a torn ACL, there is nothing to stop this from happening so your knee will wobble and rotate in ways that it was not meant to do.

This instability can cause you to fall and cause even more damage to your knee or other parts of your body.

This is perhaps the least common symptom of an ACL injury, but it is just as serious as the others.

If you have even one of these symptoms, it is definitely imperative that you seek medical treatment for your knee so you can prevent the possibility of hurting yourself even more.

The anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, is found in the front of the knee.

The main purpose of the ACL is to keep the thigh bone from rotating on the shin bone.

ACL injuries can be painful, but they are mostly just a nuisance.

If you have an ACL injury, then your knee will give out on a regular basis and without warning, which will cause you to fall down a lot. Most people who have ACL injuries seek ACL repair immediately after noticing the problem.

ACL repair is done through an out-patient surgery on the knee.

The first thing the knee surgeon will do is make sure the ACL injury did not cause any additional knee injuries that would require more invasive and serious surgery.

After the surgeon is satisfied that it is only the ACL that is in need of his or her attention, they will begin the surgery on the ACL.

The surgeon will then scrape off the ACL that remains and begin replacing it with muscle tissue that has been taken from other parts of the knee.

After the replacement tissue is prepared, it is then put into place by the surgeon. Then, the surgeon tests the knee joint for stability before sewing the knee back up.

ACL Repair – Recovery & Prevention

The surgery for ACL repair takes such a short amount of time, but the recovery takes quite a while.

From the time that the ACL surgery takes place to the time when you can expect to be fully recovered ranges from four to six months – six months is preferable if you are an athlete and planning to return to the sport that caused the injury.

Any deviation from the rehabilitation course that your physical therapist prescribes for you and you could re-injure the ACL.

That would mean you would have to go through the whole process all over again.

The best thing to do would be to avoid injury to your ACL to begin with, thus making ACL repair unneeded.

This is easier said than done if you are an athlete. The best way to help ensure that you do not injure or re-injure your ACL is to wear a knee brace on a knee that has a history of giving you problems.

It will help keep the knee from giving out on you while you are walking or doing activities.

Prevention is definitely the best way to go when it comes to things like ACL injuries.

Prevent the problem from happening and you will not need to have ACL surgery at all.

Most people who get an anterior cruciate ligament tear know that it has happened.

There will generally be swelling, excruciating pain and a sense of instability with the knee that is affected.

However, there are times when people think that the pain and swelling of the knee is just a normal side effect from hurting it and will not seek medical treatment.

If you have injured or traumatized your knee in any way, it is important to seek treatment from a doctor because leaving an ACL tear untreated can cause even more damage to the knee.

Anterior cruciate ligament tear repair surgery is an out-patient procedure – in other words, you arrive for surgery in the morning and you are usually back home by mid-afternoon.

The knee surgeon will make sure that there is no further damage involving the knee before going forward with the surgery.

The first thing the surgeon does once inside the knee is to scrape off the remaining anterior cruciate ligament from the knee.

Then, they will prepare some replacement tissue, usually from the hamstring muscles of the knee, and put it in place.

The surgeon will then make sure the knee is stable enough with the replacement tissue before closing up the knee incision.

The next step in treatment for an anterior cruciate ligament tear is to recover. While the surgery on the torn ligament itself is rather short, the recovery time is very long.

Anterior Cruciate Ligament Tear – You Need Time To Recover

If you are not an athlete, you can look at the recovery process to take as long as four to six months. If you are an athlete, the recovery process can take up to nine months until full recovery and full return to your sport.

Of course, everyone is different and your recovery time could be shorter or longer than that. Your physical therapist will assign you a recovery regimen with goals that need to be met before you move on to the next stage of recovery.

After you get one anterior cruciate ligament tear, you will want to make sure you do not get another one in the same knee.

This can be difficult if you are an athlete because sports-related injuries are just a given in that field.

One way to help make sure you do not re-injure the same anterior cruciate ligament is to wear a knee brace whenever possible.

This will help with your balance as well during recovery.

As long as you do everything you can in order to prevent anterior cruciate ligament injuries, you will most likely not have to go through this whole process again.

If you have an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury, you will want to know everything you can about the torn ACL treatment that your doctor is going to do for you.

The first step in getting treatment is surgery.  There is no way to get around having surgery for a torn ACL.

Because of the nature of the ACL and what it does, it will have to be replaced.

The ACL keeps your thigh bone from rotating on your shin bone.

Once you have damaged your ACL, it can no longer serve this function and it will cause your knee to be unstable and cause you to fall and get even more extensive injuries.

Torn ACL treatment surgery is minimally invasive and is done as an outpatient procedure. You will report to the hospital or clinic in the morning and you will be home by the afternoon or early evening at the latest.

The doctor will get rid of any lingering ligament on your knee and replace it with muscle tissue, usually from another part of your knee.

Once the doctor is sure the tissue is stable enough for weight bearing, the incision site will be closed and you will go home after they are sure that everything is okay with you.

Torn ACL Treatment Long Road Ahead

The nest step in your torn ACL treatment plan is the long recovery process.

After you have the surgery, you need to plan on being out of commission, as it were, for at least four months.

It would be wise to count on being away from regular activities for at least six months though if you are an athlete. It can even take up to nine months before you are able to do what you were able to do in sports before the surgery.

You will work with a physical therapist all during that time and you will have small goals to meet before you can move on to the next phase of recovery.

Some people progress faster than others, so your recovery time may be shorter than the average. Just remember to get the okay from your doctors before going back to your regular activities.

Prevention is the final step in torn ACL treatment. Once you have had an ACL injury, you will realize that you need to be careful not to get another one.

Most athletes can’t afford to repeat the recovery process for ACL injuries – this is especially true for professional athletes.

Always remember to warm up before beginning any type of physical activity and also start a strength conditioning program.

These are the two best ways to prevent further ACL injuries.

The ACL surgery recovery timeline generally varies from person to person and case to case.

After having the surgery, you will work with a physical therapist on a recovery plan.

This recovery plan will usually consist of various milestones or goals that you need to reach by a set date before you can move on to the next phase of ACL recovery.

Every goal, no matter how small it may seem, is equally important and vital for your recovery process.

The overall recovery period, from the time you have the ACL surgery until the time in which you can return to full activities with your knee, lasts anywhere from four to six months.

This process can be longer depending on the type of sport played if you are an athlete.

The beginning stages of the ACL surgery recovery timeline can be the hardest and most difficult to master, even though the movements are as basic as simply extending the leg and weight bearing on the knee.

The main goal for the first few weeks is to be able to walk without the use of crutches. You will do a lot of the same types of exercises for the first four weeks in order to meet the goal of walking without crutches.

These exercises are meant to help you regain your balance and stability in the use of your knee that had the ACL surgery repair.

ACL Surgery Recovery Timeline Healing Time

By the second month of the ACL surgery recovery timeline, you will begin doing new exercises meant to further your recovery progress.

The main goal during this time period is to regain full range of motion with the repaired knee. Months three and four are focused primarily with getting back full strength of the repaired knee and getting almost full balance back.

By this time, you should be able to do some light running or jogging as well as beginning to be able to jump without the threat of falling down upon landing.

The fourth month pretty much marks the end of your physical therapy treatment plan if you are not an athlete – with the exception of doing maintenance exercises at home, of course.

Your ACL surgery recovery timeline will only be extended by several more months if you are an athlete planning to return to your sport or if you did not recover as well as expected during the first four months.

The important thing to keep in mind with your recovery is that there is no plan that is set in stone.

Your physical therapist will continually evaluate your progress and adjust your plan accordingly.

You may recover faster than expected or you may have delayed progress.

As long as you make sure to completely recover before going back to full activity on the knee, you will be fine.

Getting an ACL injury is very serious.

Most people think that the swelling or pain associate with an ACL tear is just a normal thing for injuring the knee and it will go away with time, but the fact is that the injury will not go away without repair and can cause even more serious damage to the knee.

The surgery to repair a torn ACL is pretty standard and basic, but if you keep going on a knee with a damaged ACL, the damage and surgeries required to fix it could become very extensive.

ACL injury repair surgery is an outpatient procedure that is done in the morning.

The way that the surgeon will repair the ACL is pretty simple: they will get rid of any lingering ligament on your knee and replace it with muscle tissue from another part of your knee.

The doctor will make sure the replacement tissue is stable and then close the incision site. You will usually be home by the afternoon and will start your recovery process pretty soon thereafter.

The time for recovery from an ACL injury will vary depending on your case, but usually runs from four to six months.

ACL Injury Road To Recovery

Recovery can last as long as nine months for athletes or those who do not progress as well as they should have. You will start out with small exercises and goals and work your way up to full activity by the end of your recovery regimen that the physical therapist prescribes for you.

Every case is different though, so you need to be sure to follow the therapist’s instructions to the letter in order to recover from your ACL surgery properly.

After your recovery, it is important to not re-injure the ACL. If you are an athlete, however, this can be easier said than done.

The main way to prevent a recurrent ACL injury is to make sure you are 100% recovered before going back to full activity.

You may think that you are fully recovered just because you no longer feel pain with certain movements, but you need to get the all clear from your doctor and physical therapist before going back to all of the activities that you previously enjoyed – especially if you participate in contact sports.

Not doing so will put you at risk for re-injury or even doing more damage to your knee than you had done previously.

If you have ever had an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury, you most likely knew it immediately because of the symptoms. ACL injury symptoms are pretty standard from case to case, but there are times when someone with an ACL injury has little to no symptoms to alert them to what is going on.

However, most of the time, you will have at least one of the symptoms if you have a torn ACL. It is extremely rare to not have any symptom at all with an ACL injury.

The most common out of the ACL injury symptoms is swelling of the knee. The knee swelling with an ACL injury is almost always present and usually fairly quickly after the injury occurs.

If your knee swells about five to ten minutes after the incident, then you more than likely have torn your ACL.

Sometimes, a person will disregard the swelling as just a normal thing from injuring the knee and will not seek medical attention for several days or even weeks after the injury.

This is bad in many ways, but most importantly because continuing to put pressure on a torn ACL can cause even more knee damage and will need more extensive knee surgery than simple ACL repair.

Always go see your doctor after injuring your knee, especially if swelling is present.

Pain is the next most common out of the ACL injury symptoms. With a torn ACL, the pain can be moderate or it can be severe. It just depends on the person and their tolerance for pain.

ACL Injury Symptoms Pain + Swelling = See a Doctor

Like swelling, many people do not pay attention to the pain as a warning sign that something bad is wrong with their injured knee. They simply think the pain will go away in time as the knee heals.

Again, this is dangerous because you can cause even more damage to your knee.

So, if you have pain with your knee injury, you should definitely go see your doctor or go to the emergency room in order to prevent any further damage.

The final thing on the list of ACL injury symptoms is knee instability. When there is an ACL injury, it causes the knee to be wobbly and can cause the knee to sort of give out, thus making you fall.

This is usually viewed as a nuisance and is something that a lot of people with ACL injuries think they just have to live with.

This is not the case.

The instability of the knee can be fixed with simple ACL repair surgery.

The quicker you get your ACL injury taken care of, the quicker you will be back up to par and can do all of the activities you once enjoyed.