Physiotherapy
Knee Pain Physiotherapy in Singapore
Written by Zita Sham, Fairuuz Saleh and Ching Yee, Principal Physiotherapists at Phoenix Rehab.Clinically reviewed by Louise Yow, Principal Physiotherapist and Director, AHPC A1300363H.Last reviewed 27 September 2026.
Two people can have identical knee scans and completely different amounts of pain.
Cartilage has no nerve supply. Whatever is hurting in a worn knee, it is not the worn surface itself. It is the bone underneath, the lining, the capsule and the muscle around it, and those are the parts that respond to work. That is why a scan tells you less about your knee than what your knee can actually do.
$230 per 45 minute appointment. No referral needed to start.
Where are you right now?
Something happened
A twist, a pop, a landing. Swelling within a few hours points at something structural; swelling the next morning usually does not. Either way, get it looked at rather than waiting to see.
It has crept up
Stairs, squatting, getting out of a chair, the first ten minutes of a run. No single injury you can name. This is the biggest group and the one that responds most predictably to loading.
You have had surgery, or you are booked in
ACL reconstruction, meniscus, a replacement. Your surgeon’s protocol decides the timeline. Send us the operation note and we will tell you where you should be.
What is usually behind it
The common causes, and how they behave
Knee osteoarthritis
Wear in the joint surfaces. Stiff in the morning, sore on stairs, worse after a long day. The scan finding and the symptoms correlate poorly, which is the useful part: quadriceps strength and daily load change how an arthritic knee feels even though they do not change the cartilage.
Patellofemoral pain
Pain around or behind the kneecap, worse on stairs, squatting, or after sitting with the knee bent for a long time. Often called runner’s knee. Usually a load and control problem involving the hip as much as the knee.
Meniscus tears
Two very different things under one name. A traumatic tear in a younger knee behaves like an injury. A degenerate tear in an older knee is often found on a scan alongside arthritis and is frequently not the thing causing the pain.
Ligament injuries
ACL, MCL and the rest. The history usually tells the story before the examination does: the direction of the force, whether it swelled immediately, whether the knee gave way. Not every ACL injury ends in surgery, and that decision depends heavily on what you need the knee to do.
Tendinopathy
Patellar tendon at the front, hamstring or ITB at the sides. Overload rather than damage. These respond to graded loading and reliably do not respond to rest, which is why they tend to drag on for months.
Send us your scan report or referral letter
We will tell you what it means for your rehabilitation, when therapy should start, and roughly how long it takes. No appointment needed to ask, and no charge for it.
We explain what the report means for your recovery and the likely timeframe. We do not diagnose from documents, which needs an assessment.
Before anything else
Knee pain that is not a physiotherapy problem
- Emergency department now for a knee that is obviously deformed, a knee you cannot weight bear on at all after an injury, or a knee that swelled up within an hour of the injury and locked.
- A doctor the same day for a hot, red, swollen knee with fever, which can be a joint infection and does not wait.
- A doctor the same day for calf pain, swelling, warmth or redness below the knee, particularly after surgery, a long flight or a period of immobility.
- A doctor soon for a knee that keeps giving way, keeps locking, or swells every time you use it.
How the work is structured
Four stages, and you move up on criteria
You progress when the knee meets the marker for the next stage, not when a number of weeks has passed.
- Calm & Protect. Settling swelling and irritability, and getting the quadriceps switching on again, which it stops doing almost immediately after an injury or an operation.
- Move & Mobilize. Full straightening first, then bend. A knee that does not fully straighten changes how you walk and loads everything else.
- Rebuild & Strengthen. Quadriceps, glutes, calf, then single leg load. This is the stage people skip and the reason knees come back.
- Return & Perform. Stairs, squats, running, cutting and landing, tested rather than assumed.
None of the four is passive.
After knee surgery
Post-surgical knee rehabilitation
Rehabilitation starts when your surgeon clears it, and their protocol takes precedence over anything written here. Bring the operation note to the first appointment.
ACL reconstruction
The most structured pathway we run, and the longest. It is staged and criteria-based to the end, because returning to cutting and landing on an under-prepared knee is how the second one happens. We work to your surgeon’s timeline and to what you need the knee to do.
Total knee replacement
Early movement and a normal walking pattern matter more than most people are told. Range that is not regained in the first months is considerably harder to get afterwards.
Meniscus surgery and arthroscopy
A repaired meniscus and a trimmed one have completely different loading rules and completely different timelines. The operation note tells us which, and getting it wrong in either direction costs you.
If it has stopped moving forward
Months on and the knee still is not right
A knee that has plateaued is usually a strength problem that was treated as a pain problem. The quadriceps never came back, the single leg work never started, and the knee has been managed rather than rebuilt.
The Stalled Recovery Review is three appointments over three weeks with the same therapist, because strength change cannot be measured in one visit. $690.
After a kneecap fracture, the Patella Fracture Recovery Program runs the four stages to your surgeon’s protocol.
What it costs
$230 per 45 minute appointment
One therapist, the same one every visit, for the whole 45 minutes.
Nett, no GST. Same price for your first appointment and your last. Most of that 45 minutes is treatment: manual therapy, joint mobilization, soft tissue work and graded loading, with assessment continuing throughout. You do not pay for a consultation and come back another day to be treated.
A knee program is 12 appointments, $2,760 in all, paid as you attend. If you need more, your physiotherapist shows you which stage criteria are still open, and each extra appointment is $230.
Questions we get asked
My scan says bone on bone. Is there any point?
Yes, and the reason is in the first line of this page. The worn surface has no nerve supply, so it is not the thing generating the pain. Strength, load management and how you move change symptoms substantially in knees that look identical on a scan. It also matters if you do end up having a replacement, because a stronger knee going in has an easier rehabilitation.
Should I stop running?
Usually not entirely. Running does not wear knees out in the way people assume, and stopping deconditions everything that protects the joint. What changes is volume, surface, cadence and what strength work sits alongside it. That comes out of the first appointment rather than from a rule.
Do I need surgery for a meniscus tear?
Often not, particularly for a degenerate tear found alongside arthritis. For a traumatic tear in a younger knee, or a knee that locks, the answer changes. That is a conversation between you, your surgeon and your therapist, and it rests on what the knee does rather than on the report alone.
Why does my knee hurt going down stairs more than up?
Going down loads the quadriceps eccentrically and puts more pressure through the kneecap than going up does. It is one of the more useful things you can tell us, because the pattern points at where to look.
How long after ACL reconstruction can I play again?
Longer than most people hope, and it is decided by tests rather than by a date. Strength compared with the other leg, hop and landing quality, and confidence all get measured before anything is cleared. Returning early is the single clearest risk factor for doing it again.
Where we are
Five clinics across Singapore
ORCHARD
400 Orchard Road #12-12
Orchard Towers, Singapore 238875
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Orchard →
WhatsApp 8800 1830TAMPINES
9 Tampines Grande #01-20
Asia Green, Singapore 528735
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Tampines →
WhatsApp 8780 9608SERANGOON
265 Serangoon Central Drive #04-269
Singapore 550265 · Lift C only
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Serangoon →
WhatsApp 8892 4121TANJONG PAGAR
10 Anson Road #02-77A
International Plaza, Singapore 079903
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Tanjong Pagar →
WhatsApp 8227 7074JURONG EAST
2 Venture Drive #02-02
Vision Exchange, Singapore 608526
Opening 20 October 2026
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Jurong East →
WhatsApp 8242 7340Find out which stage your knee is in
Tell us what it stops you doing and whether it swells. Those two answers tell us more than a scan report does.
Knee physiotherapy is available at all clinics. $230 per 45 minute appointment, nett, no GST.
What our patients say
Google reviews from our clinics in Singapore.
