Insurance covered the Synvisc for me, guess it's less expensive than knee replacement. Since they did cortisone at the same time, I"ll know in a couple of months... last cortisone injection didn't last much longer than 2 months before the pain started ramping up again. I'm having some pain, but not enough to really limit me, at least not until I get more fit. I did 4 hour stretches at the Frederick Fair last week with only a couple of sitting-down breaks. I do see some swelling again. Knee joint is bone-on-bone on the outer half, bone spurs all over tearing up the cartilage, not much that can really be done to fix it other than replacement. If the Synvisc lets me put it off for a couple years, great, but when it starts limiting my mobility again I'm going under the knife. :-)
If anybody likes the idea of Weight Watchers but doesn't want to do the meetings (or pay the fee), do check out PeopleOne Health. They are marketing their program to corporations, tailored to their employee populations, but they are still including a totally free version (supported by the corporate version). I've only taken off a few pounds so far, but I set my goal at a very modest 1/2 pound a week, so that's fine.
