How to Reduce Knee Pain as You Age
Medically reviewed by: David M. Joyner, MD, FACS
According to a national poll, over 70% of older adults reported joint pain, a condition common in later decades of life and often caused by osteoarthritis. Whether you've already been diagnosed with the joint condition or want to avoid the discomfort, mobility issues, and reduced quality of life that can come with knee pain, prevention is key.
Keep reading to learn how to reduce knee pain in old age with simple strategies, like low-impact exercise, vibration therapy, strength training, and flexibility work.
Why Knee Pain Becomes More Common With Age
Why does knee pain seem to crop up or get worse as the years pass by? It can have to do with natural wear and tear on the joints, reduced muscle mass and cartilage, and various age-related risk factors.
Natural Wear and Tear on the Joint
As noted, osteoarthritis is a top cause of knee pain in aging adults. It's a degenerative condition, meaning it happens over time due to natural wear and tear. Decades of joint use (simply from living your life and moving your body) eventually deteriorates the supportive tissue that keeps the joint padded so it can move smoothly and painlessly.
Reduced Cartilage and Muscle Support
Knee pain can happen in your 40s, 50s, and beyond because of thinning cartilage (that's the supportive tissue around bones and joints we mentioned). Older adults, especially women, can also experience reduced muscle mass and overall strength, which can mean there's less support for the knees, making it painful to walk, stand up, sit down, and move around throughout the day.
Risk Factors for Aging Knees
Besides lowered bone density and muscle weakness, several risk factors for aging knees can increase your chances of experiencing knee pain. This includes:
- A sedentary lifestyle (getting very little physical activity day to day)
- A BMI (body mass index) in the overweight or obesity range
- Past injuries, particularly lower-body injuries
- Lack of flexibility or general mobility issues
- Repetitive stress on the joint, like running, crouching (as with gardening, for example), or standing for long periods
We'll get into how to prevent knee pain as you age below.
How to Take Care of Knees After 50: Early Prevention Is Key
If you Googled "how to take care of knees after 40" (or 50, 60, and beyond), you're in the right place.
As always, it’s best to get in touch with a healthcare provider about knee pain or any other joint issues. That said, prevention is a big part of staving off knee pain, but even if you're already experiencing it, you can address the issue proactively to keep long-term discomfort and mobility issues at bay.
Strategies to Protect and Strengthen Your Knees
When it comes to how to prevent knee problems in old age, your best bet is to incorporate multiple strategies:
- Staying active with low-impact exercise
- Strengthening muscles around the knee
- Improving flexibility and range of motion
- Maintaining a healthy body weight
- Prioritizing balance and stability training
Get more details and specific pointers ahead.
Stay Active With Low-Impact Exercise
One of the best ways to reduce and prevent knee pain is to stay active with low-impact exercises that involve joint-friendly movements, like walking, swimming, cycling, or vibration training.
In addition to making time for low-impact workouts, aim to get more movement throughout the day. This could mean getting up from your desk every hour or so to walk around for a few minutes, doing chores at home, playing with your kids or grandkids, or grocery shopping.
Strengthen the Muscles Around the Knee
Another approach is to strengthen the muscles in your lower body and those surrounding your knees. To work your quads, hamstrings, glutes, and calves, do moves such as gentle squats, stationary lunges, calf raises, and deadlifts. Instruction from an exercise profession can be helpful to ensure these exercises are performed correctly and safely.. A recumbent bike can be good for strengthening these muscles as well.
Whole body vibration has also been shown to boost knee-extension strength, meaning your quad muscles (fronts of the thighs) are strong enough to support a fully extended knee (straightening one leg while balancing on the other in a standing position or extending one leg out straight while sitting).
Improve Flexibility and Range of Motion
Working on flexibility can go a long way in improving range of motion. This can help you not only get the exercise you need to build strength but also to do basic movements more easily, like get out of bed, stand in the kitchen while making dinner, and walk up and down stairs.
Try to do a few minutes a day of gentle stretching, and don't forget to warm up before exercise with dynamic stretches i.e. actively moving your muscles through a full range of motion . Dynamic stretches involve active movements, like arm circles or side-to-side steps. Whole Body Vibration can help here too—research shows it helps with flexibility without making muscles stiffer.
Aim to Maintain a Healthy Body Weight
Excess body weight is a risk factor for osteoarthritis. It can put more load on bones, joints, and tendons, speeding up the natural wear and tear that can happen with age. To keep knee pain at a minimum (or prevent it altogether), aim to maintain a healthy weight.
For more tips, see our blog on how to effectively build muscle and lose fat.
Prioritize Balance and Stability Training
When choosing what type of exercise to do, look for activities that prioritize balance and stability to help even out the load on your knees and prevent falls. Many bodyweight moves challenge your balance and help build core strength, like single-leg stands, reverse lunges, planks, dead bugs, and bird-dog. Seeking out professional exercise instruction is a good way to ensure these exercises are being performed correctly and safely.
Whole Body Vibration engages the lower body while activating the stabilizing muscles in the glutes, abs, and hips. This can help with a more balanced gait (how you walk) and proprioception (your sense of your body placement and how your limbs are moving) while enhancing overall mobility.,
How Power Plate Supports Knee Health and Longevity
Ideal for addressing knee pain for people as they age, Power Plate's whole body vibration plates are backed by science. The patented PrecisionWave technology has been shown to:
- Enhance muscle activation without strain
- Boost circulation
- Improve joint mobility
- Reduce stiffness
- Support active recovery
Keep scrolling to learn more about why our vibration plates are a go-to for low-impact at-home exercise.
Enhances Muscle Activation Without Strain
Power Plate's multidirectional vibration is designed based on years of research and peer-reviewed studies looking at the benefits of vibration plates.
Standing on a vibration plate can be as effective as a typical strength-training workout for improving muscle strength and balance— plus, it doesn't put as much stress on the knees and other stabilizing joints.,
Improves Circulation and Joint Mobility
Whole Body Vibration increases circulation, meaning it helps blood flow throughout the body. This can help with inflammation (which is often connected to pain, swelling, and discomfort in the joints) while supporting better flexibility and mobility.
Our blog has more on how vibration plates help arthritis symptoms.
Reduces Stiffness and Supports Recovery
Better blood flow can also lessen stiff joints and knee discomfort and prevent sore muscles following a workout. Combined with stronger muscles, this increase in circulation can help speed up recovery from injury, strain, or surgery.,
Our guide goes over more recovery tips and ways to naturally manage pain after knee-replacement surgery.
Ideal for Low-Impact, At-Home Exercise
In terms of how to reduce knee pain in people as they age, low-impact activities are ideal, and vibration therapy tops the list.
The vibration plates from Power Plate are designed to accelerate results with minimal impact on the joints. You can do a full workout in just 15 minutes, any time of year, no matter the weather, all from the comfort of your own home.
Perfect for seniors and anyone looking to manage joint pain or sensitive knees, vibration training helps improve bone density and muscle strength. Research also shows it can be useful in preventing osteoporosis.
Explore Power Plate's Whole-Body Vibration Collection
If you're considering a vibration plate for knee pain, chronic joint issues, injury recovery, or osteoarthritis—or just want to stay healthy as you age—Power Plate has you covered.
Be sure to speak with your healthcare provider to ensure Whole Body Vibration is right for you.
Our Whole Body Vibration plates are designed with aging bodies in mind. They provide a way to get knee-friendly exercise—anywhere, anytime—to help with mobility support, improved bone density, stronger muscles, and a healthier body.
We also have targeted vibration devices, including massage guns, vibrating foam rollers, and concentrated massagers, to help you live better, move better, and feel better every day. Browse the collections today.
Sources:
University of Michigan Institute For Healthcare Policy And Innovation- National Poll On Healthy Aging: Arthritis And Joint Pain https://www.healthyagingpoll.org/reports-more/report/arthritis-and-joint-pain
The Mayo Clinic: Knee Pain https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/knee-pain/symptoms-causes/syc-20350849#:~:text=Osteoarthritis.,may%20even%20come%20and%20go.
Journal of Korean Medical Science. Prevalence of Knee Pain and Its Influence on Quality of Life and Physical Function in the Korean Elderly Population: A Community Based Cross-Sectional Study. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3172649/
Caspian Journal of International Medicine. Knee osteoarthritis prevalence, risk factors, pathogenesis and features: Part I. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3766936/
European Review of Aging and Physical Activity. Is whole-body vibration beneficial for seniors?. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11556-011-0094-9
Sports Medicine-Open. Effect of Low-intensity Exercise on Physical and Cognitive Health in Older Adults: a Systematic Review. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4612316/
Gait & Posture. Effects of whole body vibration training on postural control in older individuals: A 1 year randomized controlled trial. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0966636206002864
Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. Whole-Body-Vibration Training Increases Knee-Extension Strength and Speed of Movement in Older Women. https://agsjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1532-5415.2004.52256.x
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