PRP therapy stands for platelet-rich plasma therapy and if you haven’t heard of it, you aren’t the only one! But believe it or not, PRP therapy has been used in regenerative medicine techniques and stem cell therapy for quite some time now, and you might even end up benefiting from it some day.
It might seem a bit complicated but that’s really only because we don’t use too many words and terms associated with PRP therapy in our daily lives. To un-complicate the issue, here are a few key terms everyone should know:
- PRP therapy: Just to explain it a bit more, PRP therapy involves a patient’s own platelets, which are separated from other blood cells after the patient’s blood is drawn, and this plasma full of platelets is then injected to the region where a patient needs healing. Platelets naturally help the blood clot but they also assist in the healing process, so PRP therapy just gives patients a boost.
- Regenerative medicine: This type of medicine is still being tested out although it’s been used to treat difficult diseases and injuries for a while. It uses stem cells to generate new tissues and cells that help combat certain diseases and injuries.
- Stem cell therapy: Stem cell research is often categorized as controversial because it can involve embryonic cells, but adult cells can also be used for certain stem cell therapies. These cells are harvested and used to grow new cells — but not necessarily clone the cells– which will create new, healthy tissues.
- Adipose stem cells: You’ve definitely heard of adipose tissue, although you probably know it by another name: fat. This tissue is actually pretty cool because it’s where your body stores regenerative cells that can grow into a variety of different tissue types, depending on how the cells are manipulated by researchers via certain environmental factors.
PRP therapy might seem confusing at first, but when you break it down, it’s really all as simple as a bunch of cells!
