Opioids are pain-relieving drugs that interact with opioid receptors in your brain cells, releasing signals that reduce your perception of pain and boost your feelings of pleasure.
As doctors, we know that this can be dangerous. Those feelings of euphoria a person gets from taking opioids often lead to addiction. And at high doses, opioids can slow the user’s breathing and heart rate, leading to death.
Opioid misuse and addiction have created a significant public health epidemic in Illinois. You don’t want your patients with chronic pain to be at risk of developing a dependence or becoming another fatality statistic.
Regenerative medicine offers viable all-natural options for reducing pain due to musculoskeletal disorders. Treatments containing mesenchymal stem cells and platelet-rich plasma are gaining popularity for providing fast and effective pain relief without the use of drugs.
Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine for Pain
Since undifferentiated stem cells can develop into various cell types, we center our pain relief around these regenerative properties. With regenerative medicine, we inject our patients with stem cells that develop into specialized cells within the body to repair or replace diseased or damaged tissue. This form of therapy treats the underlying cause of musculoskeletal disorders rather than masking your patients’ pain the way opioids do.
In Charleston, Illinois, our medical center is known for its breakthrough treatments containing Wharton’s jelly-derived mesenchymal stem cells and growth factors. We source this material from tissue banks that receive birth tissue donations and perform umbilical allografts. Wharton’s jelly is rich with youthful, effective mesenchymal stem cells and growth factors that release therapeutic, anti-inflammatories to reduce pain while helping patients heal.
Injections containing stem cells also contain cytokines, hyaluronic acid, joint lubricants, and more substances that naturally occur in the body. These treatments are safe and carry fewer risks of adverse reactions than taking opioids. These injections also contain all-natural substances within the human body, making them far superior for pain relief and getting your patients back to their normal function.
Platelet-Rich Plasma Therapy
Platelet-rich plasma injections are another breakthrough regenerative medicine procedure that treats a wide range of pain-related conditions without the use of drugs. Platelets contain hundreds of growth factors that stimulate the healing process to increase tissue regeneration. We develop PRP by taking vials of a patient’s blood, centrifuging it, and then super-concentrating the platelets into the separated plasma.
Platelets help increase blood flow to the site of an injury, damage, or disease, allowing the area to receive vital nutrients. PRP will also stimulate the patient’s stem cells to help with healing.
Before treating a patient with opioids, consider the all-natural, effective alternatives that regenerative medicine offers.
Regenerative therapies like injections of mesenchymal stem cells or platelet-rich plasma are useful in the treatment of the following:
- Back pain
- Knee pain
- Shoulder pain
- Joint pain
- And more!
You can help prevent opioid abuse with drug-free alternative treatments for managing pain. Regenerative medicine helps heal the body in the case of injury and disease and can be to manage the pain of chronic, degenerative conditions.
