What is Osgood-Schlatter Disease?

Osgood-Schlatter Disease is commonly experienced by adolescents who are experiencing rapid growth spurts. It is a condition where the bones are growing at a rate which the muscles find hard to keep up with and puts extra strain on the bone and tendon where your tendon attaches onto the bone just below your knee cap. 

Symptoms of Osgood-Schlatter disease often include pain below the knee cap with running or high impact sports, development of a “bump” at the top of the shin bone which is sore to touch and may become red or inflamed.

Management of this condition involves addressing the muscle tightness in your quadriceps muscle to ensure that the muscle tightness does not create increase load on the tendon. Taping of the patella tendon can also help to decrease the load on the tendon and therefor the help to reduce the amount of swelling and irritation around where the tendon inserts onto the bone.

Poor biomechanics of the foot and lower limb can also contribute to the development of Osgood-Schlatter disease. Therefore it is important to make sure there is sufficient control and strength of the lower limb especially during high impact activity.