What Can Regenerative Medicine Do for Your Knees?

If you're suffering knee pain caused by arthritis, you are likely to experience some disabilities and maybe even miss some of your workdays. Conservative treatments are usually the go-to when it comes to pain relief and it starts with physical therapy, anti-inflammatory medications, and opioid pain medications. Injection therapy using corticosteroids and hyaluronic acid are sometimes used for the next line of knee cartilage repair. Then, the last options are usually arthroscopy, subchondral bone drilling and microfracture.

The downside of these treatments is that the patients will continue to progress and may resort to knee joint replacement surgery. This is where mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) therapy for knees comes into play because it is minimally invasive and has the potential to reduce inflammation, repair joint cartilage, halt the progression of arthritic damage, and delay or avoid knee replacement surgery.

Articular Knee Cartilage Damage

Articular cartilage damage, particularly on the knee joints, is classified as a major clinical problem because of how poor the intrinsic ability of this tissue is to repair itself. The main purpose of joint cartilage is to allow smooth gliding of the joint surfaces and protect the surrounding bones from experiencing stress. This is the reason why most of us are able to perform well in sports activities. Articular cartilage is responsible for absorbing shock in the knees and can carry up to 20 times of the body weight.

The Impact of Osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis is known as a chronic degenerative disorder that can lead to the gradual degradation of the knee joint cartilage. It can arise from a prior injury to the knee joint such as fracture, ligament tears, and tendon damage.

Over time, osteoarthritis can cause joint instability due to the wear and tear in the articular cartilage. Arthritis doesn't only affect the cartilage but can also lead to the damage of the bone beneath the cartilage, muscles, ligaments, tendons, and the synovial lining to the joint.

Types of Mesenchymal Stem Cells for Degenerative Knee Cartilage

Injection of progenitor cells has proven to be a better approach to repair degenerative cartilage compared to implantation of differentiated cells like the articular cartilage. Adult MSCs have better potential to differentiate into bone, cartilage, fat or soft tissue.

They are also capable of relieving degeneration and inflammation, and even modify the immune system activity that can provide influence on the surrounding cartilage in the damaged area.

So far, pre-clinical and clinical trial results have shown evidence of the safety and efficacy of MSC therapies for the treatment of osteoporosis and knee cartilage damage. Cell-based therapy has become the sole focus for tissue engineering research on the functional replacement of cartilage and meniscus regeneration.

Years of animal study has provided research that shows how MSC treatments can provide structural regeneration with mechanical properties that are on par with the native cartilage.

Potential Treatment Results

Clinical results from previous and ongoing studies are very promising wherein they demonstrate the ability to improve the pain and generate knee cartilage repair. Many patients have avoided knee surgery because of the results they've got from advanced MSC therapies. Further studies will aim for defining specific cell and growth factor combinations to enhance the efficiency of cartilage regeneration.

Many athletes have already benefited from advanced regenerative therapies for orthopedic pain. A world-renowned superstar, Rafael Nadal, has even undergone fat derived from MSC procedures twice already. After a successful procedure for his knee ailment, Nadal continues to play highly competitive tennis, and achieving major wins.

To know more about mesenchymal stem cell therapy for knee pain, you can go contact Dr. Alex Tam by calling (707) 474-5688. He owns the top chiropractic and holistic center in the Solano county so you can give his services a try to see how the treatment works for you.