Knee replacement recovery: physical therapy in Chatsworth

• Range of motion and swelling, early.Getting the knee moving and the swelling down comes first, inside what your surgeon allows.
• Bend and straighten.For everyday function, Dr. Ed works toward about 110 degrees of bend and a knee that straightens fully, to 0 degrees or as close to it as possible.
• Gait retraining.He watches you walk, finds where the pattern is off and retrains it.
• Quad strength.Dr. Ed builds it with exercise, and with electrical stimulation (NMES) where it helps.
• Stairs and the car.You practice what the knee has to do every day: stairs, and getting in and out of the car.
• Walking, gardening, golf.These are what the work builds toward. Tell Dr. Ed what you want the knee back for.

Bring your surgeon's post-op protocol and your discharge paperwork to the first visit. Dr. Ed works from your surgeon's instructions, not a generic plan. That visit is an evaluation: he examines how the knee moves and how you walk, then explains what he found in plain terms.

From there, treatment is hands-on and one-on-one, with a short home program. Both are adjusted each visit as you progress.

How long recovery takes depends on your knee and how your body responds. Dr. Ed does not quote a number of visits up front. He sets the plan after the evaluation and tells you plainly what to expect.

Evening and Saturday appointments are available.

• Pre and post-op physical therapyPrehab before surgery, and recovery after knee, hip and shoulder surgery.
• Hip replacement recoveryIf your surgery was on the hip instead.
• Knee replacement recovery: the first six weeksFor the early weeks after surgery.