Lateral Ligament Rupture

What is the lateral ligament? What are the symptoms of lateral ligament injury? And what are the causes? Alex Dodds, knee specialist for The Cotswolds, Cheltenham & Gloucester, explains.

What is the lateral collateral ligament and what does it do?

Like all the ligaments in your knee joint, the lateral collateral ligament (LCL) acts as a sort of rope which keeps the bones of the knee in place and prevents them from extending beyond the normal range of movement.

The lateral ligament sits on the outside of your knee and connects the thigh bone to the fibula, the smaller of your lower leg bones, which sits alongside the shinbone. It’s sometimes called the fibular collateral ligament.

What causes a lateral ligament tear?

There are several types of ligament injury. They can be twisted, sprained (stretched) or ruptured (torn). Ruptures can be partial or full tears.

LCL ruptures tend to be caused by the knee joint being forced outward, away from your other knee. That might be through sporting injury (a bad tackle during football or rugby, for example). Swift, sudden changes of direction, of the sort you might make in skiing, rugby or football) can cause tears. A fall or car accident may also result in an LCL injury.

I tend to see fewer LCL tears at my Cheltenham knee clinic than MCL injuries. LCL injuries do, however, tend to be more severe than MCLs.

What are the symptoms of a lateral collateral ligament injury?

If you injure your LCL, you will likely experience pain or tenderness on the outer side of your knee joint. You may see bruising. The knee may feel stiff and it may swell (although that doesn’t happen in all cases). It is common to feel some instability as though the knee is about to give way – particularly when walking downstairs, for example. That happens because the ligament that was holding the bones of the joint tightly in place is no longer able to do its job effectively.

How do you diagnose an LCL injury?

Visit my knee surgery for Cheltenham and Gloucester and the first step in diagnosis will be a physical examination of your knee. We’ll also carry out an MRI scan, because that will show any damage to other soft tissues in the joint (often, ligament damage isn’t confined to a single ligament). We may also carry out an x-ray if there’s a question of damage to the bone. Contact our Gloucestershire knee clinic for a swift diagnosis.

How do you treat LCL tears?

Low grade sprains don’t usually require surgery. More serious ruptures may need surgery (although they can often heal on their own in time). You can find out more about treating ligament sprains here.

Find out how we treat LCL tears.

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