Patients looking for alternative treatments for joint or muscle pain may be referred to a pain specialist who offers prolotherapy. Along with procedures like PRP injections and stem cell therapy, prolotherapy is part of a broad family of medicine known as regenerative medicine.
The question on the minds of some patients is whether there are any known safety issues with prolotherapy. After all, an alternative therapy may not be worth trying if the risks are too high. But according to the pain specialists at Lone Star Pain Medicine in Weatherford, TX, prolotherapy is completely safe. There are no known safety issues related to it.
A Summary of Prolotherapy
In general, the goal of regenerative medicine is to utilize minimally invasive procedures that encourage the body to heal injury on its own. Procedures like prolotherapy are intended to jump-start the healing process, if you will. Once the healing process gets going, the body takes over and does what it is designed to do.
How does prolotherapy accomplish this? By alerting the body to soft tissue damage or injury. This is accomplished by injecting a sugar or saline solution into the affected joint or muscle. The solution acts as an irritant to purposely cause inflammation.
Strangely enough, Western medicine approaches inflammation as something to be eliminated. Yet inflammation is a natural reaction to injury and disease, a reaction that tells the body’s repair system that something is wrong. Prolotherapy takes advantage of the body’s natural reaction to inflammation in order to jump-start the healing process.
No Serious Side Effects
To date, no serious side effects have been reported in relation to prolotherapy procedures. For starters, the injected solution is benign. There is nothing in the solution that is considered dangerous to humans.
That said, prolotherapy is performed via injections. Therefore, all the common side effects related to injections of any sort also apply to prolotherapy. Patients may experience:
- injection site pain
- injection site bleeding
- minor numbness or tingling
- a full feeling in the affected joint or muscle.
It is theoretically possible for patients to experience an allergic reaction or nerve damage. However, no such reports have been made to date. There is also the risk of injection site infection. But again, that risk exists with all injections.
Prime Candidates for Prolotherapy
Prolotherapy is a procedure best utilized for musculoskeletal issues. We are talking bones, joints, muscles, tendons, and ligaments. It is gaining popularity among sports medicine specialists, rehab specialists, and orthopedists.
Some of the more common conditions prolotherapy is recommended for include:
- chronic lower back pain
- osteoarthritis pain (in any joint)
- general, nonspecific muscle pain
- sports injuries involving muscles and tendons.
Whether or not prolotherapy is an appropriate treatment is up to doctors and patients to decide. Just know that many doctors do not believe in the benefits of regenerative medicine and are reluctant to recommend it. Others know of prolotherapy but don’t believe they have enough knowledge or experience to make a recommendation.
A Noninvasive Alternative
The best way to describe prolotherapy is to say that it is a noninvasive alternative to more traditional treatments. You may choose to look into it rather than taking prescription pain medications or electing for a more invasive treatment option.
If that’s the case, you can rest assured that there are no known safety issues with prolotherapy. It is a safe procedure utilizing a benign solution injected into the affected tissue for purposes of promoting healing. Any side effects you might experience are very likely to be minor. In short, prolotherapy offers no cause for concern.