Hi,
thank you for providing the brief history of your mother.
A thorough musculoskeletal assessment is advised along with MRI of the knee.
As my area of concern is about geriatric i will be happy to help here.
Since your mothers age is 74, and having the left
knee pain in the tibial region, i feel that she must have a lot of
muscle weakness, followed by reduced joint space. Also, the cartilages must have some wear and tear along with the ligament damages.
I feel your mother need to undergo
physical therapy, like - therapeutic
ultrasound therapy and TENS therapy for inflammation and pain. Also, this is totally non invasive therapy so no side effects will be there at all.
On later stages performing slow ROM exercises and small isometrics should help reduce pain and improve the overall functionality.
In my practice i see maximum of
geriatrics and 90% of patients who continue the physical therapy as recommended responds well with the good outcome scores.
Regards
Jay Indravadan Patel