Prolotherapy is a treatment technique used for chronic myofascial pain, back pain, osteoarthritis, and sports injury. It involves repeated injections of a dextrose solution or other irritating substances into the joint, tendon, or painful tissue in order to provoke a regenerative tissue response.
How does prolotherapy help?
Prolotherapy is a recognized orthopedic procedure that stimulates the body’s healing processes to strengthen and repair injured and painful joints and connective tissue. It is based on the fact that when ligaments or tendons (connective tissue) are stretched or torn, the joint which they are holding destabilizes and can become painful.
Prolotherapy, with its unique ability to directly address the cause of the instability, can repair the weakened sites and produce new collagen tissue, resulting in permanent stabilization of the joint. Once the joint is stabilized, pain usually resolves. Traditional approaches with surgery have more risk and may fail to stabilize the joint and relieve pain, and anti-inflammatory or other pain relievers only act temporarily.
The original term used for this therapy was sclerotherapy, coined in the 1930s when this treatment was discovered, and it included both joint and vein injections. Today the term prolotherapy is used for joint, ligament and tendon injections, while sclerotherapy is used for the treatment of varicose veins, spider veins, hemorrhoids and other vascular abnormalities.
