Osgood-Schlatter and Growing Pains

For Young Learners

Structure and Location

Run a finger down from your kneecap. A couple of centimetres below it, on the front of your shin, there is a bony bump. That is where the big tendon from your thigh muscle attaches to your shin bone.

While you are growing, that attachment point is not solid bone yet. It is a growing area, and growing areas are softer than the tendon pulling on them.

Function

The reason it gets better is simple. The problem is a mismatch between a hard pulling tendon and a soft growing area. When the growing area closes and becomes ordinary bone, the mismatch disappears.

That is also why it is tied to age rather than to how tough you are.

Clinical Relevance

Every time your thigh muscle contracts hard, it tugs on that spot. Running, jumping, kicking, sprinting. During a growth spurt, when you are training a lot, that tugging can irritate the growing area.

The result is a bump that is bigger and more tender than it was. It hurts during and after activity, it is sore to kneel on, and it settles with rest. Both knees are affected in a lot of people. It has a name, Osgood Schlatter, after the two doctors who described it.

There is a similar one at the bottom tip of the kneecap rather than on the shin, which behaves much the same way.

Three things are worth knowing. It is extremely common in active teenagers, particularly during a growth spurt. It is not causing damage that will matter later. And it resolves when the growing area finishes growing and turns to solid bone, although the bump itself often stays as a permanent reminder.

The ache people call growing pains is usually something different: a vague ache in the legs, often in the evening, not tied to one spot and not tied to activity. Pain in one exact place that is worse after sport is worth mentioning to an adult rather than filing under growing pains.