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Alternatives To Knee Surgery

Alternatives to Knee Surgery

Believe it or not, it’s now a researched based fact, that is showin a broad scientific consensus that meniscectomy, commonly referred to by surgeons as a ‘clean-up’ surgery’, is next to useless and risky for most patients. (1)

It produces results no better than a fake surgery,(2) or exercise therapy.(3)The risks of things going sideways are greater for those who need more repair, have been in pain longer, and have more arthritis going in.

Although ‘cleaning-up’ the joint sounds like common sense that isn’t exactly what happens during most knee arthroscopic procedures.

In fact, the British Medical Journal “makes a strong recommendation against the use of arthroscopy in nearly all patients with degenerative knee disease … ” regardless of “imaging evidence of osteoarthritis, mechanical symptoms, or sudden symptom onset.”

That means if you have an significant arthritis you should re-think getting knee surgery, as studies have piled up showing that it does no better than not getting surgery and at worse it can accelerate the osteoarthritic process.

"As appealing as arthroscopy might be, patients shouldn't waste their time or their money," says lead researcher J. Bruce Moseley, MD, tells WebMD. Popular Knee Surgery May Be Useless (webmd.com) "There are going to be surgeons out there who will continue to do it, because they will rationalize that the study isn't applicable to their patient population. But I would hope that most surgeons would not do it anymore."

Treatment Alternatives to Knee Surgery

At our Alternative Medicine clinic in the Denver metro area in Littleton (Ken Cary), when we come across patients with mechanical joint and arthritis related knee pain we assess through advanced imaging either MRI, musculoskeletal ultrasound and or x-ry to assess the integrity of the joiunt and soft-tissue. Most knees that are in phase 1-3 of degeneration are optimum candidates for regenerative medicine treatments for their knee pain. The side effects and risk are nearly none.

The treatments that have been shown to be most effective for chronic knee pain are:

1. Prolozone: Prolozone for knee pain and arthritis is safe, effective and affordable.

You can learn more about ozone treatments here.

2. Platelet Therapy (PRP)- We use special and advanced medical equipment and technology to actually ratio plasma to platelets to come up with a ‘super-dose’ personal dosing to ensure best results. This is traditional PRP but the technology makes it far more accurate in terms of the individual patient. Platelets are the most powerful signaling cells in your entire immune system (even signals your own stem cells) to create a healing a response to repair and regenerate damaged tissue.

Here's a study form Web MD that summarizes the research showing that knee surgery may be close to useless.

Knee Surgery Sure is Useless! (painscience.com)

References

(1) Thorlund JB, Juhl CB, Roos EM, Lohmander LS. Arthroscopic surgery for degenerative knee: systematic review and meta-analysis of benefits and harms. BMJ. 2015;350:h2747. PubMed #26080045 ❐ PainSci #53297 ❐ A review of nine studies as of 2015 presenting strong collective evidence that meniscectomy is a futile surgery for most patients.

(2) Sihvonen R, Paavola M, Malmivaara A, et al. Arthroscopic partial meniscectomy versus sham surgery for a degenerative meniscal tear. N Engl J Med. 2013 Dec;369(26):2515–24. PubMed #24369076 ❐ “In this trial involving patients without knee osteoarthritis but with symptoms of a degenerative medial meniscus tear, the outcomes after arthroscopic partial meniscectomy were no better than those after a sham surgical procedure.”

(3) Kise NJ, Risberg MA, Stensrud S, et al. Exercise therapy versus arthroscopic partial meniscectomy for degenerative meniscal tear in middle aged patients: randomised controlled trial with two year follow-up. BMJ. 2016;354:i3740. PubMed #27440192 ❐ PainSci #53299 ❐ This large trial compared exercise to surgical cleanup of the menisci and found “no clinically relevant difference was found between the two groups … at two years.” They didn’t include patients with locked knees, trauma, and most had no osteoarthritis.