How is a meniscus tear treated?

Treatment for a young athlete with a meniscal tear once again can have several different levels of complexity to it. We always exhaust our nonoperative measures first. Time, rest, anti-inflammatories, ice, physical therapy. Oftentimes those nonoperative measures are enough to make this meniscal tear asymptomatic. If those don't work, then oftentimes we're talking about operative treatment in the form of knee arthroscopy, where we use small instruments through tiny incisions to go in and find the meniscal tear, and typically do one of two things. 

Either, if it's a small, relatively innocent meniscal tear, we can trim out the torn portion of the meniscus. If it's something bigger or more serious and involved in a young athlete where we're trying to get them back into sport and maintain their knee for many years to come, then oftentimes we're talking about actually repairing the meniscal tissue in that scenario.