Compartment Pressure Studies.

Compartment pressure studies are performed by Dr Leesa Huguenin for people suffering from lower leg pain thought to be caused by compartment syndrome and not responding to conservative therapy.

This test closely replicates the effect of exercise on your legs and allows her to watch what happens to the pressures in your muscle compartments before, during and after exercise.

After a warm up run, a plastic catheter is inserted into the muscle compartment of the leg under local anaesthetic. You are then asked to exercise appropriately to induce pain in the areas of your legs usually affected.

Your leg pressures are monitored during exercise and for at least 5 minutes after, until they normalise.

If your pressures are above diagnostic levels and you have already given conservative management a good go, you may be a candidate for surgery.

If your pressures are normal, we may need to search a little wider for some less common causes of exercise related leg pain.

If you think you may need these tests, it is imperative that you book with one of our doctors for a clinical assessment first. We consider them to be a pre surgical test. If testing is warranted, it can be arranged directly from that appointment.