More Evidence for Bone Marrow Prolotherapy
Chondrocyte Implantation and Bone Marrow Prolotherapy for Cartilage Injuries
A promising therapy for cartilage tears involves implanting chondrocytes, the cells that make up cartilage. Like Bone Marrow Prolotherapy, chondrocyte implantation involves extracting chondrocytes from the patient’s body and injecting them into the injured joint. Unlike bone marrow, it is difficult to obtain adequate amounts of them and they have a slow proliferation rate. In other words, they take a while to generate cartilage to repair tears and defects.
 A study in the American Journal of Sports Medicine compared the use of bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells to the use of chondrocytes1. The reason the researchers were interested in these bone marrow stem cells is because they are much easier to extract, they have a better proliferation rate than chondrocytes and they have the capacity to change into various types of soft tissue cells. As our Prolotherapist, Dr. Ross Hauser says, the body knows best. Therefore the body can take these premature cells and create various types of cells needed to heal the specific injury.
The results of the study were in favor of bone marrow. The researchers studies two groups – one group that received chondrocyte implantation for cartilage tears and another group who received bone marrow implantation for cartilage tears. The bone marrow went head to head with chondrocytes and proved to have the same level of improvements in healing cartilage. The researchers also looked at the patient’s overall health and concluded that both groups had an improvement in quality of life, health and sports activity. One advantage that bone marrow had over chondrocytes was that patients over age 45 had just as much improvement as younger patients whereas older patients in the chondrocyte group did not have quite as much improvement as younger patients.
The study concluded that bone marrow is an excellent surgery alternative for cartilage tears and defects. Bone marrow biopsy is less invasive than knee arthroscopy and does not damage articular cartilage like surgery does. It also costs less! We at Caring Medical are big believers in Bone Marrow Prolotherapy and we would love to talk to you more about your specific injury. Contact us to learn more about Prolotherapy or follow our blog, Facebook page and Twitter account.
1. Nejadnik, H., JH Hui, EP Feng Choong, BC Tai, and EH Lee. "Autologous Bone Marrow-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells versus Autologous Chondrocyte Implantation: An Observational Cohort Study." The American Journal of Sports Medicine 38.6 (June 2010): 1110-6.
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