In our modern age, we have a lot of tools we can use to promote health and healing. Take regenerative medicine as an example. Built on research about how our bodies heal themselves, this field has found new ways to tap into the body’s naturally occurring regenerative power.
Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy is one form of regenerative medicine. It uses properties found in your blood to stimulate healing. That makes it powerful for everything from acute injuries to pain from degenerative conditions like arthritis.
Dr. Jonathan Carlson offers PRP therapy here at our Hawai’i Pain and Spine office on the Windward side of O’ahu in Kailua. This gives patients a safe, effective, medication-free way to address certain joint problems and injuries. All of this said, this treatment doesn’t work overnight.
PRP therapy works by taking the platelets in your blood, concentrating them and adding them to a little bit of plasma, and injecting that into the area having the issue. Once there, the growth factors in your platelets go to work to stimulate your body’s natural healing processes.
But in the same way that most injuries don’t heal overnight, PRP therapy doesn’t work instantaneously. Many people see improvement in somewhere between 4–6 weeks, although some notice the effects sooner.
Dr. Carlson talks with you about what to expect for your own timeline. This varies depending on the injury or condition you’re treating, the location of the issue, and other factors that are specific to you.
PRP therapy starts when Dr. Carlson takes a very small sample of your blood. Using a centrifuge, he spins out the other components in your blood, separating out the plasma and the portion that’s rich in platelets and their growth factors.
Dr. Carlson then injects the PRP into the area around your injury. To ensure you’re as comfortable as possible, he can give you a local anesthetic to numb the area before treatment.
Dr. Carlson carefully plans the injection sites and uses ultrasound guidance during treatment in an effort to optimize the effectiveness of your PRP therapy.
You don’t need to plan any downtime after this type of therapy. You might have a little achiness or soreness, but it should dissipate within a few days.
The PRP goes to work right away, but it takes time for the regeneration that it stimulates to take place. Over the next 4-6 weeks, the new tissue should grow. And over that time, your pain should gradually lessen.
Some patients get sufficient relief with one PRP therapy appointment, but others choose repeat sessions to continue improving their results. Talk with Dr. Carlson about what could be right for you.
To explore PRP therapy for yourself and get an estimate for how long it would take you to see results, schedule an appointment with Dr. Carlson. You can do that by calling our office today.
