One study of PRP injections showed that nearly 84% of patients treated experienced a 25% or greater reduction in pain. If you’re experiencing chronic pain, you might be wondering what are PRP injections? These injections seem almost magical in how professional athletes and some doctors talk about them.
Just like with other medical treatments, they aren’t for everyone. We’ve created this guide to help you determine if PRP injections can help you.
What Are PRP Injections?
These are injections that can promote healing within the body. PRP stands for platelet-rich plasma. PRP therapy uses the healing powers of your own plasma proteins to encourage natural cell growth.
How PRP Injections Work
The injections take plasma isolated from your blood and inject it into the damaged tissue. This stimulates the body to grow new cells and heal the area. The concentrated plasma is thought to encourage your body to target the area for healing so that it can heal faster.
PRP Injection Treatments
There are several ways that you can use PRP injections to encourage your body’s natural healing processes.
Hair Loss
Male pattern baldness has plagued men for centuries. Some are taking a modern approach by using PRP injections to promote new hair growth.
Tendon Injuries
Your tendons are the bands that connect your muscles to the bone. They are the slowest to heal after an injury. If you have a chronic tendon issue, PRP injections can help heal the tendon faster
Acute Injuries
An acute injury is a sudden or one-time injury. The most common acute injuries treated with PRP are sports-related. This includes injuries like knee sprains or a pulled hamstring.
Post-Surgery Healing
Post-surgery PRP injections can help your body recover. Sometimes surgery is required to repair a tendon.
Osteoarthritis
The traditional therapy for people with osteoarthritis is to inject hyaluronic acid. But it has been found that PRP injections are more effective. Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis.
The PRP injections helped patients by improving their quality of life and reducing the number of symptoms they experience.
PRP Injection Process
Your medical professional will begin by drawing your blood. The amount needed will depend on the area of the body you want to be treated. The blood gets put into a centrifuge to separate the different components.
The separated plasma is then prepared for injection. The doctor will typically use an ultrasound to pinpoint the exact areas where the injection should take place.
The entire process can take about an hour.
Are PRP Injections Right for You?
Now that you know the answer to, what are PRP injections, you can decide if they are right for you. These injections use your body’s own healing mechanisms to boost the healing process.
PRP injections can help your body by focusing the body’s healing efforts on the areas that need it most. This can reduce the overall recovery time and risk of reinjury.
Check out the health section of our blog for more helpful articles like this one.
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