If blood therapy hits a familiar note, then it is not all unfamiliar. Platelet-Rich Plasma falls under a specific blood therapy.
So is Platelet-Rich Plasma (PRP) purely hype, or is it the real thing? Platelet-Rich Plasma injections bathe troubled cells in a concentrated mixture produced from your own blood. This stimulates healing where it is otherwise failing and any stubborn, slow-motion injuries like tendinitis. In a nutshell, PRP therapy is fairly new, so there need to be more studies as well as cases to truly verify if it is a legitimate form of treatment.
What Is PRP?
Platelet-Rich Plasma, also known as PRP, is a minimally-invasive treatment used for different concerns such as hair loss and sports injuries as well as dry eyes. For chronic dry eyes syndrome, the eye solution Enrich uses it.
Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) is a substance aimed to promote healing when injected. Researchers and clinicians produce PRP by isolating plasma from the patient’s blood and then concentrating it. Athletes have been known to use these injections to help soothe and alleviate their sports injuries.
Plasma is a component that is taken from your blood. It contains special “factors,” or proteins, that help your blood to clot, as well as proteins that support cell growth. Researchers produce PRP through the isolation of plasma from the blood of the patient and putting it through a concentration process.
The idea is that injecting PRP into damaged tissues will stimulate your body to grow new, healthy cells and promote healing. Because the tissue growth factors are more concentrated in the prepared growth injections, researchers think the body’s tissues may heal faster.
Although PRP is considered minimally invasive, it has not been proven and approved as a treatment by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
How Does It Work?
PRP works in theory by taking about 2 ounces of your blood and spinning it in a centrifuge that separates components by their weight. The Red Blood Cells (RBC) are at the bottom of the tube plasma with very few platelets on the top, and in between, there is a “buffy coat,” where the platelet-rich plasma is to be found.
Purely, PRP can pertain to pure platelets, or it may include white blood cells and/or fibrin, the product of fibrinogen. As a result, overall, there can be four different forms of PRP based on the amount of time and speed of the blood spinning in the centrifuge.
What Makes PRP Effective?
What makes PRP effective are:
- Platelets. Platelets are the major clotting tool in your blood; they possess interesting biological features, but they are best known for their work in clotting, which is what gives them their healing mystique.
Concerns
Health Canada has concerns about PRP and its popularity. The organization recently released a statement: “Many emerging autologous cell therapy products may eventually prove to be safe and effective. However, most of these products are currently at the investigational stage of development with an ongoing need to gather supporting scientific evidence.”
Wrapping Up
Studies on PRP currently are limited with regard to its effectiveness. As a whole, the research sphere regarding PRP is highly inconclusive, and the data.
Author’s Bio:
Deinah Storm works in the corporate industry, but she has quite a bit of knowledge about beauty, health, and skin care. On her free days, she finds solace in writing and educating more people about taking care of your beauty, skin, and wellness.