Knee pain but no bruising after dropping onto it; should I continue to exercise?

Jumped down a hatch on my ship, hit my knee on the way through, lower part of knee top of tibia, pain amazing of course. Not much bruising to be seen, worse after I have been sitting for a while, what are your thoughts on whether I should train in martial arts tommorow? Have a grading in June so practise versus rest. T.I.A
Answer:
You say 'no bruising' and 'not much bruising to be seen', but the damage can be internal (knee components banging into each other, rather than just the outside of your knee banging on the hatch) and difficult to see.The golden rule is always ' Don't push your luck, buddy !'.In this case, it probably means that you should keep the joint moving, but try to put as little pressure on it as possible for about three days. After this, you build up gradually until you are sure that it will take the loads, before getting back into full-speed (acceleration is pressure) and full-impact (deceleration) training. Your training for the grading will not suffer from missing out the power exercises and speed training for a while; you can practice for kata sitting in a wide square stance across an office chair and 'ghosting' the movements. If you have a training buddy who will help, the two of you can both benefit from upper-body-only sparring (both of you sit for this; it's excellent for 'reading', and isn't used often enough because most people feel silly doing it).It is probably wise to be cautious about your return to full training, because even if the injured knee can still take full loads, it will be vulnerable to further injury. Because of the existing damage, a normally harmless knock or twist might put you right out of action.You should also think about using a hinged knee brace to support the joint as you get back up to speed; again, the key is to ignore anybody who thinks you're being wussy about it.

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I think it will be better for you to rest for atleast a week or so as you could cause more damage to your knee if your excercise then there will be no grading in June! Go visit your doctors and see what they say

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No! You should go to a doctor and get it checked out. If it's worse than it was now it will keep getting worse if it isn't seen to by a doctor especially if you do martial arts

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Wait 'till the pain goes before strenuous exercise.

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Check it out at the doctors now now now! Happened to a friend of mine, he hit the top part of the tibia (the little bony lump- its called the tubercle) and didn't think much of it. But he'd caused some bleeding behind the knee, which had formed a haematoma which started to ossify (go hard) and he's still having problems 2 years down the line, and probably always will to some degree. If he'd had it checked out right away they may have been able to drain the bleeding somewhat and prevent the problem. As it is, they can't do anything but manage it now - it's not the end of the world, but do get it checked if you're a sportsman, it might cause you problems later if there's something there. Hxx

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