It’s getting harder to walk or climb stairs. Exercising is seemingly impossible, and some days even getting out of a chair or out of bed hurts. Pain medications have stopped working. Anti-inflammatories and steroid injections helped short term, but you still feel pain. You also feel frustration and anxiety in the face of knee replacement surgery. You’re not alone: Doctors perform over 600,000 knee replacement surgeries in the U.S. each year. Dr. Johnson offers knee replacement patients another viable option that doesn’t come with the pain, risk and recovery time of traditional knee replacement surgery: stem cell therapy.
What Triggers the Need for a Knee Replacement?
One of the main reasons behind the need for knee replacement surgery is osteoarthritis. Osteoarthritis affects over 27 million Americans. It develops when the cartilage that cushions the knee joint breaks down. Pain occurs from inflammation caused when the bones scrape against each other during movement.
Other reasons for knee replacement surgery include rheumatoid arthritis, injury or blood clots. Read more on arthritis Stem Cell Therapy for Rheumatoid Arthritis and Stem Cell Therapy for Arthritis
How Can Stem Cell Therapy Help to Prevent a Knee Replacement?
Stem cell therapy can help prevent a knee replacement because stem cells have the powerful ability to relieve pain and may even regenerate damaged cartilage. Pain is relieved by reducing the inflammation in the knee
Why Is Stem Cell Therapy Better Than Knee Replacement Surgery?
In contrast to traditional knee replacement surgery, which in many cases requires the removal of bone, stem cell therapy is minimally invasive. Dr. Johnson uses a specialized type of liposuction to harvest adipose fat stem cells from around the waist. Read more Understanding Adipose-Derived Stem Cells This part of the procedure, known as harvesting, requires only local anesthesia instead of sedation, and in many cases, only a small bandage afterward. After collection, Dr. Johnson injects the stem cells into your affected knee joint.
The entire procedure – harvesting the cells and deploying them into the affected knee – takes less than an hour, and most patients return to their normal activity within a day. This fast turnaround is much different from the conventional knee replacement surgery that requires rehab for weeks or even months after surgery.
Stem cell therapy also means less pain and fewer risks of infection and complications than traditional surgery.
One More Thing About Knee Replacements
Patients considering knee replacement should be aware that the replacement joints used today have an expected lifespan of 15 to 20 years. This means that if you have your knee replacement in your 50s, you could need one again in your 60s or 70s. Stem cell therapy can help reduce the need for future knee replacement by healing the joint from within instead of replacing it with parts that eventually wear out!
Want to know more about how Innovations Stem Cell Center can help you? Call us today at (214) 643-8665.