Treat Your Own Knees

The book gives practical exercises and explains the functionality that the knees should possess. Overall a nice book. Needed to order this for my mothers knee agony and would say it was reasonably effective in making the pain manageable.

A really useful book and easy to understand.

small book , difficult to read and totally useless

Answering the criticsFirst, let me say that I was having almost constant low-grade pain in my left knee for about five years. Occasionally, I would gently twist my knee by accidentally dragging the ball of my foot on the ground which would result in two or three days of acute knee pain. Getting in and out of the car was a real chore. And sometimes my knee simply felt loose like it might come disassembled. I could feel stuff moving around in there.I bought this book, read it, did exactly what it said, and in about a month I was 95-98% pain free and my knee no longer felt "loose". For more, see my comments under Brian Hurler's 3-Star review. I feel I am qualified to review this book by answering the critics.The complaint is made that the book doesn't discuss specific treatments for specific knee disorders. Johnson spends a lot of words explaining why that's usually not necessary. If you can restore function by strengthening the knee support system, then the specific cause of the pain and disability is irrelevant. Johnson also tells you when you should see a doctor to seek specific diagnosis and treatment.Yes, all of Johnson's recommendations could have been put on one sheet of paper but then the reader might not be motivated to try the suggested regimen because he/she would not understand why those particular exercises were recommended and why they might be effective.One commenter complained that there was nothing about strengthening knees to prepare for playing tennis. The book is for people who have painful knees that need treatment. Nowhere is the book billed as an all-purpose comprehensive preparation for strenuous athletics although I believe the exercises in this book would be a good place to start - They build strength, flexibility, stamina, and proprioception. Then you can find more strenuous exercises that work the same muscles. Get the Men's Health Big Book of Exercise for some ideas.The complaint is made that there are only 4 exercises and those could have been obtained from a good chiropractor or a good PT. One of the things I like about Johnson's books is that he only gives you the minimum of exercises that will do the job. You don't waste your time doing redundant exercises and you don't waste your time doing exercises that haven't been proven to help the problem. It's very efficient. What is the cost of a chiropractor or a PT? And how do you know you have a GOOD one? How do you know if the exercises they give you will be as efficient and effective as these proven ones?One commenter recommends that you hire a personal trainer to train "all your muscles back to good form while using proper positioning to reduce further injury." In my experience, the exercises in this book are explained thoroughly enough that proper form can be executed; the exercises are effective at building the necessary strength and flexibility to reduce or eliminate knee pain; and they are certainly gentle enough that they aren't going to cause further injury.Effective, as advertised, for the problem and efficient of your time - I don't understand the complaints. Personally, I don't want to spend my life exercising or at the gym or at the chiropractor's - I just want to have a pain-free knee.

This book is a nice, compact, small reference guide which gives a few good suggestions on how to tackle knee problems. I'm going to try a few of the suggestions and see whether they assist my slightly problematic knee. I get knee pains when running and stopped a few years ago. I have recently taken up triathlon and think that 'prevention is probably better than the cure'. Definately worth the few quid invested even if it doesn't work for me......