Affecting over 20, 000, 000 Americans, Osteoarthritis remains to be one of the most popular forms of arthritis characterized by a breakdown of joints most commonly in the knees, hips, spine, elbows, ankles and shoulders that might result from stress or an injury.
A functional cartilage of any young adult who is healthy is composed of a matrix that contains a mixture of sugars, proteins, collagen, and water. In the matrix, we have the chondrocytes whose primary purpose is to make the matrix they exist in.
Cartilage can withstand any additional load put on it simply because it can go back to the way it was initially after the load is lifted. Trauma or anything close may damage cartilage. This changes the way it functions. To restore the cartilage back to its normal condition, the chondrocytes begins to involve the devastating enzymes. A series of reactions start to take place such as, the deformation of the bone that is underlying, joint lining and production of cytokines which are protein messengers that work best to stimulate the inflammation.
These processes encourage the cartilage to wear away followed by a deformity as well as chronic inflammation influenced by unusual activities at the joint. To treat osteoarthritis, health experts have involved a series of remedies that involve anti-inflammatory drugs free of steroids, physical therapies as well as injection of hyaluronic acid or corticosteroid to the joints.
Stem cell therapy has with time gained some popularity for being among the best promising remedies for osteoarthritis as well as its ability to bring back the cartilage to full functionality. However, this doesn’t mean that a one-time stem cell application will do the magic.
There have been several tests that have been carried out to figure out how stem cells can work together with the scaffold to effectively activate regeneration of the cartilage.
Several reviews have targeted to explain the scaffold types that can be put to study. Among them are, biomaterials such as sugars, chitin, the cell walls of algae, silk, fibrin, collagen and more. Seeded with several growth factors, the scaffolds works nest to stimulate the multiplication and division of stem cells while at the same time shielding them from being destroyed by a harsh environment which is the arthritic joint.
Now, to use autologous stem cells in modern clinical medicine, there is a need to involve fat as a scaffold for the matrix. Together with several growth factors obtained from the components of blood, the matrix activates the certain biometric scaffold as mentioned above.
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