PRP Injections to Help Alleviate Joint Pain

Over the last decade, there has been a strong focus on the development of “regenerative medicine” in the world of orthopaedics. PRP is a form of regenerative medicine that focuses on harnessing and amplifying your body’s ability to heal and one of many non-surgical treatments for managing joint pain.

PRP injections use a concentration of a patient’s own blood platelets to accelerate the healing of soft tissue such as the muscle or tendon or modify the disease activity within arthritic joints. This is done by taking peripheral blood and separating the plasma from the red blood cells and injecting them into the soft tissue or joint. The platelets release growth factors that both stimulate and increase the number of reparative cells in the area. Ultrasound is often used to ensure the injection is performed accurately in the area of need.

Non-surgical Treatments for Managing Joint Pain

See below for a cross-sectional view of a patella tendon, thickness identified by bracket, before and after PRP injection. The black, also known as hypoechoic, is the area of chronic tendinitis and marked by the red area.