The joints of a child under one year old may crack due to the fact that his musculoskeletal system is not yet sufficiently developed. And in general, many symptoms that should alert an adult or elderly person are just signs for a baby that he is developing according to schedule. The same goes for crunching and clicking in the joints. If it does not cause your baby pain or other discomfort, it will most likely go away on its own over time. But even if it doesn’t go away, the crunching and clicking noise is not necessarily a symptom of some terrible disease. Children are rarely born with hereditary increased mobility of joints and ligaments. Remember if any of your relatives or ancestors suffered from a genetic joint disease? If yes, show your baby to the doctor.
It is also worth paying attention if one joint cracks or, for example, the child cannot fully bend one leg or arm. In this case, it is a good idea to consult an orthopedist or surgeon. If by the age of three your child still has cracking or clicking in at least one joint, this is also a reason to visit a specialist.
The joints of a teenage child are also subject to heavy loads associated with the restructuring of the body. However, by the time they reach school, many children already have some acquired musculoskeletal disease. So if your student is bothered by the crunching and clicking of joints, or certain movements cause him pain, go to an orthopedist for a correct diagnosis and timely treatment. Advanced joint diseases can lead to much more serious problems.
There is no specific treatment for cracking joints. If the use of medications or therapeutic exercises is required, all this must be decided by a doctor in any case. If the joints of a child under one year old are clicking, rule out dysplasia and add foods rich in calcium to his diet: milk, cottage cheese, fish. Perhaps he should be given more water so that more joint fluid is formed. Speaking of hip dysplasia: today, it seems, every newborn child is checked for its presence right in the maternity hospital.
Gymnastics, morning exercises and a generally active lifestyle are of great importance for the health of a child’s joints. Actually, preventing joint diseases comes down to following the rules of a healthy diet and a healthy lifestyle. For teenagers with joint problems, swimming or cycling can be recommended. But, for example, running marathons or lifting weights with weak joints is not recommended.
A very common occurrence in newborn babies is cracking joints. Hearing a strange sound, parents may panic - what if something is wrong with the child? Most often, if a baby’s joints crack, this is an absolutely normal phenomenon, because the musculoskeletal system is not fully formed. A little time will pass and the crunch will disappear.
Initially, the joint apparatus of children is represented not by bones, but by cartilage tissue. It provides joints with mobility and makes them softer. This feature can be attributed to the protective function of the body: it protects itself from the occurrence of injuries, which are inevitable at the moment when the child is just learning to walk.
Collagen fibers in adults have an ordered structure, but in children they remain multidirectional for some time. The muscles of the buttocks and thighs are considered the strongest in the body, and at an early age they are not yet sufficiently developed. When the child begins to walk, the muscles will begin to develop.
All of the listed features of the baby’s body answer the question of why the joints of the limbs and the joints of the pelvic bones crunch.
During outdoor games, the baby's legs may make sudden, atypical movements. As the limbs return to their typical position, the ligaments contract and help return the bones to their proper place. It is at this moment that the joint feels like it is making a click.
Most often, there is no danger in such a sound, but sometimes crunching signals possible serious complications.
Let's take a closer look at why baby's joints crack.
The reason may lie in the following.
For children under the age of 1.5 years, the occurrence of joint crunch is absolutely normal. By 3 years it disappears completely. However, there are a number of factors that may require you to contact a specialist.
When contacting specialists, a series of tests are often prescribed to identify the source of the problems.
These include:
If no pathological abnormalities are identified after examination, no special treatment is prescribed.
Also, joints crunch and click if they are underdeveloped, and then a special correction is prescribed.
If there is insufficient fluid inside the joint, it is often prescribed to give the baby a lot of fluids (water, juices, compotes).
Rheumatism and the presence of infectious diseases require treatment with antibiotics and medications that relieve inflammation. Non-steroidal analgesics and glucocorticoids are used to treat arthritis.
Hypermobility and excessive weakness of the muscular-nervous system are the main indicators for therapeutic massages and the necessary set of exercises. Some doctors prescribe medications to normalize muscle tone.
The hip bones are formed during pregnancy. A timely visit to a doctor who is managing your pregnancy is the main preventive measure for the proper development of joints. In order for the baby to be born healthy and strong, the pregnancy must be planned, you must visit a doctor, take a course of multivitamins and pass all tests.
While waiting for your baby, you should not smoke, drink alcoholic beverages or take medications that the doctor has not prescribed.
Children's bodies develop at a rapid pace. To ensure its full formation, vitamins, minerals and trace elements are needed in sufficient quantities. For rickets, 2-3 drops of vitamin D, sunbathing and diet may be prescribed.
When muscles, ligaments and bones grow properly, they need a constant supply of calcium. This can be easily achieved by giving children such types of foods as fish, milk, fruits (especially bananas - they have a high potassium content and some calcium), dried apricots, and broccoli.
This food is intended for older children. The baby can be provided with everything necessary through mother's milk, and after 5-8 months, complementary feeding begins with the above products.
Crunching in the joints of a baby can be treated using the simplest techniques - for example, dysplasia is treated using special swaddling. As a rule, treatment gives better results if carried out for up to 3-5 months.
If you delay and do not carry out surgical treatment when indicated, the child may remain disabled.
Often, when giving a newborn child a massage, or performing simple gymnastic exercises with him, parents hear a characteristic crunching sound in some parts of the body, like in adults. In order not to worry unnecessarily, you need to consult a doctor and find out why your child’s joints are cracking, what to do about it and how to eliminate a specific symptom.
Despite the fact that in most cases the cause turns out to be physiological and absolutely harmless, it is better to make sure of this immediately. Untimely diagnosis of a number of pathologies, accompanied by such an unexpected manifestation for childhood, can cause a lot of unpleasant moments for the child and require long-term treatment.
In the vast majority of cases, joint crunching occurs due to imperfections in the muscular system. This phenomenon is considered normal if it occurs in children under one year of age and gradually goes away on its own. In addition, you should not ignore other provoking factors:
Advice: Many mothers are sure that the cause of the unpleasant crunching is insufficient development of the joints. They try to move the baby’s head, arm or leg more, hoping that this will speed up the “recovery”. In fact, in most cases, this only aggravates the situation and causes additional discomfort for the baby.
In some cases, joint crunch turns out to be a harbinger of an incipient disease. If you react in time, you can prevent the onset of the pathological process.
Ideally, any cracking in the joints should be reported to your doctor. This recommendation becomes mandatory if the following manifestations occur against the background of the symptom:
It is not recommended to conduct experiments on a child using folk remedies or drugs that help adults . It is also better to postpone physical therapy and sports activities (for example, swimming) until you visit a doctor and find out the causes of the problem.
If the pediatrician does not find anything pathological in the cracking of the joints in the baby, you should additionally visit an orthopedist for your own peace of mind. Depending on the diagnosis and severity of the situation, he may recommend the following treatment options for the baby:
If dysplasia is not treated in the early stages, then in the future the child will experience pain in the joints; deformation of the legs is possible, leading to disruption of their mobility, shape, and functioning.
In cases where all signs of pathology are truly absent, and the child’s joints continue to creak, it is necessary to adjust his diet and diet:
It happens that the measures taken still do not give the desired result and even positive changes even after several months. It is imperative to inform the doctor about this; new tests and more in-depth diagnosis of the baby’s condition may be required.
Elizaveta Grigor
The body of young children is significantly different from that of adults. This can also be said about the musculoskeletal system, one of the main elements of which is the joints of the bones, or joints.
Very often, parents, taking their children in their arms, hear an incomprehensible crunching sound or clicking sound. This phenomenon frightens many, because first of all the thought arises that some part of the body has been damaged.
There is no need to worry or panic, because this phenomenon does not cause pain at all. It should be noted that there are also children whose joints sometimes crack when moving. In infants they are very elastic and fragile, and the muscular system is still weak, so adults are sometimes frightened by very ordinary sounds.
Quite often, clicking is heard during very ordinary movements. As the baby grows, his muscles and ligaments will become stronger and his joints will begin to crack less and less. However, an exception to the norm is dysplasia - congenital hypermobility of the joints, that is, their increased mobility.
The cause is often precisely the weakness of the ligamentous-muscular system. This occurs due to an insufficient amount of synovial fluid that washes the joint or due to inflammatory diseases.
Often, clicking and pain occur with Osgood-Schlatter disease. This pathology affects only the knee joints and is characterized by the fact that it does not cause inflammation, however, pain is observed when walking, jumping, and running. The peculiarity of this disease is that it goes away on its own, without treatment.
The cause of crunching in adolescents and infants can also be diseases such as gonarthrosis, ankylosing spondylitis, osteoarthritis, glenohumeral periarthrosis, coxarthrosis, rheumatoid or infectious polyarthritis, etc.
To exclude the presence of pathology, it is necessary to visit a doctor who, for diagnostic purposes, will refer the patient to a biochemical blood test (C-reactive and total protein, alkaline phosphatase, rheumatoid factor, creatine kinase) and ultrasound of the heart.
If the research results do not show any anomalies, then the crunch is an anatomical feature. Perhaps the specialist will recommend diversifying the baby’s diet with foods rich in calcium (cottage cheese, milk, fish, etc.), as well as drinking plenty of water - water stimulates the production of synovial fluid.
What parents should pay attention to:
If you notice at least one of the above symptoms, you should consult a doctor.
Pain and clicking are symptoms of diseases such as arthritis (inflammation of the joint) and arthrosis (degenerative-dystrophic damage to cartilage). The latter is characterized by pronounced clicking, and arthritis in children most often develops against the background of sore throat.
During a sore throat, children and adolescents experience joint pain that goes away after 2-3 weeks. However, if a sore throat is not treated, rheumatism will develop. In such a situation, complex treatment is prescribed, including therapy for the throat and bones.
After the age of 12, in addition to medications prescribed by a doctor, it is allowed to take special biological supplements that reduce inflammation and increase overall immunity thanks to vitamin C (ascorbic acid).
Why do bones still crunch?
A course of therapy should only be prescribed by a doctor, having found out why the joints click. As mentioned above, there may be no need for treatment, for example, if the sounds are caused by physiological characteristics of the body. In other cases, they are guided by the results of analyzes and studies, and after identifying the source, take appropriate measures.
For diagnosis, a blood and urine test is prescribed (to identify acute inflammatory processes), a biochemical study (described above), an ultrasound of the joints to detect dysplasia and determine the amount of synovial fluid, and an ultrasound of the heart to exclude rheumatism.
You can increase your water intake to produce more synovial fluid. Or diversify your diet with foods rich in calcium and vitamin D.
The doctor can prescribe special ointments and pharmacological drugs for severe pain, as well as when inflammation is detected.
Heavy physical activity should be excluded, but physical therapy is allowed. In some cases, the child is sent to exercise therapy with an instructor.
If a teenager has low physical activity, then he may have salt deposits. In this case, it is necessary to gradually increase physical activity and lead a more active lifestyle. Massage will help get rid of salt deposits.
It is allowed to use traditional medicine recipes, but only after prior consultation with a specialist. The mother can perform a light massage for the baby on her own. In this case, special gels with collagen and medicinal plant extracts are often used.
But their use will only be needed in case of inflammation of the joint. In addition, such drugs have an analgesic effect.
As for children, the cracking of joints is explained by poorly developed muscles and fragility of bones. However, it should be noted that such symptoms can also serve as a signal of congenital joint hypermobility.
Parents should be wary if the crunching does not go away for a long period of time or is localized in the same place. A competent specialist should prescribe a series of tests and a comprehensive examination of the body to identify the true causes of the crunch.
In the absence of pathologies, an approximate menu for the child will be drawn up, in which the main place will be taken by dishes rich in calcium. This is due to the fact that this particular element contributes to significant strengthening of bones and joints. Among the main recommended products may be milk, cottage cheese, and fish. Many experts believe that it is necessary to give the child more fluid during the day, since crunching can be caused by a lack of intra-articular fluid.
As for teenagers, crunching in them can be caused by the restructuring of the body and the final formation of joints. The main peak occurs at the age of 14-16 years. In some cases, the cause of the crunching is quite serious diseases, for example, ankylosing spondylitis, arthritis, arthrosis and others. If the child does not feel pain when the fingers and knee joints crunch, it will most likely go away after some time.
If a child experiences significant discomfort when squatting and bending his knees, it is necessary to consult a specialist. The doctor may prescribe special medications and ointments that relieve pain. It is worth giving the child more rest and reducing physical activity, and it is recommended to take a course of exercise therapy. You should reduce your salt intake and regularly add yoghurts and jellies to your diet. You can offer a teenager.
Currently, pharmacy chains offer consumers a large number of various vitamin supplements and mineral complexes, which are largely capable of replenishing calcium and vitamin D reserves in the body. However, you should not purchase such drugs based only on your own opinion, since in the future they can provoke hypervitaminosis. It is imperative to consult your local doctor.
