The answer will surprise you.

How often, we go to a place and find that either the lift car is out of order or isn’t there at all and we have a couple of flight of stairs to climb. What we dread is the unnecessary exercise which we will have to go through.

Undoubted, climbing stairs causes fatigue, that’s because, when we climb stairs, our whole body is worked out, some experts even consider it a cardio for the whole body.But, did you know climbing stairs may be doing harming  your body, as much as benefit it may be giving to the body. While some people climb up and down stairs in order to reduce weight, what they don’t realize is that they are ruining their joints one step at a time.

Let us, now take you and tell you what happens to your knee joint when climbing stairs.

To understand the same, we need to understand the anatomy of the knee joint (Please refer to the image above.) When we are on the stair, the following process is happening to the knee joint.

1. The Patella part of the knee joint is regularly sliding up and down as in when the knee joint bends and then becomes straight.

2. The above bone structure is constantly coming in contact with the lower bone.

However, if you notice the above figure the Medial and the Lateral Meniscus or the overall cartilage structure is in between the two bones. The meniscus are basically a cushion and do not let the two bones come in direct contact with each other.

With age or if you are suffering with arthritis, this meniscus starts to wear of, and sooner or later the two bones start coming in contact with each other, causing pain.

The above condition is known as Chondromalacia. Which is basically due to the wear and tear of the cartilage present in the knee joint.

At Bone and Joint Clinic Noida, we get patients complaining of knee pain, and upon investigation and an X-Ray, we find that their cartilage has worn out, to their surprise they immediately ask, that their knee joint(s) never got injured, well wear and tear of the cartilage depends on a lot of factors and to the surprise of everybody, injury to the knee joint is not one of the factors.

1. Weight of the person, heavier you weigh, more wear and tear will occur to the cartilage.

2. Excessive Walking.

3. Excessive Running.

4. Excessive Climbing Stairs.

5. Excessive activities involving bending of your knee joint.

Now, to answer the question, we asked you,

Question:  Which is more harmful? Climbing up the stairs? Or Climbing down the Stairs?

Answers:  Assuming we climb down the stairs faster, climbing down the stairs harms our knee joints more than climbing up the stairs.

But, isn’t climbing down the stairs easier? Then why is it more harmful to the knee joint?

The answer to this is simple – When we climb down the stairs, the Jerk Load on the knee Joint tends to be more thus causing the wear and tear and more injury prone.

Then, how should I Climb up and Down the Stairs?

When we climb Stairs, we usually tend to maintain a constant tempo and in many cases, we even take rest in between. However when we climb down the stairs, we naturally tend to hurry and thus cause harm to our knee joints.

We recommend the following precautions

1. Climb up and down the stairs at a constant speed – Do not hurry.

2. Reduce your weight quickly, excess weight not only harms your knee joint, but is also excessively harmful to the other joints of our body and further tends to make our body more vulnerable to joint and other diseases.

3. Climb Stairs naturally, but try taking an elevator while climbing down.

4. Do not carry, excessive baggage and weights when you are on the stairs, try switching to elevators.At Bones and Joint Clinic, we treat and cater to a lot of patients suffering with knee pain. Please note that there are not one but many reasons for Knee Pain and every knee pain does not require knee replacement.We would suggest you to book an appointment with us, if in case you are suffering with knee Pain or any other Joint Pain.