At Procelsio Clinic, preserving the natural joint is always at the center of our treatment philosophy. Due to various causes—particularly trauma—isolated, deep cartilage damage can occur in the knee or hip joint. If left untreated, continued stress may lead to osteoarthritis of the affected joint.
In the past, such damage was typically treated with microfracture techniques (drilling into the bone), which often resulted in unstable replacement tissue. Today, the standard of care is autologous cartilage cell transplantation: cartilage cells are harvested from the patient, cultivated in a lab, and then used to fill the defect. The resulting tissue is comparable in quality and durability to healthy cartilage. This method has been used successfully in the knee joint for nearly 20 years with good to excellent results.
The primary application is for cartilage damage in the knee joint, often caused by trauma, overuse, or femoroacetabular impingement (FAI). It is crucial not only to assess if and how cartilage damage should be treated but also to identify and address its underlying causes. Often, the clinical picture is complex and should be managed by highly experienced orthopedic surgeons. All necessary conditions for this are met at Procelsio Clinic. Our specialized medical team is here to advise you and support you from the very first step through the entire treatment process.
In the first step, we arthroscopically harvest a small amount of healthy cartilage cells from your joint, along with a blood sample from a vein. These cells are cultivated in a specialized laboratory using only your own blood. The process is entirely biological – no additives are used. We simply support your body’s own cells in multiplying under ideal conditions. This significantly improves the compatibility of the procedure.
The resulting cells are processed into small spheres called “spheroids,” each containing up to 200,000 hyaline cartilage cells. After a cultivation period of six to eight weeks, the spheroids are transplanted arthroscopically back into the joint. Following another six weeks of rehabilitation, the defect is typically filled enough to gradually increase joint loading. After about six to eight months, the new cartilage tissue is usually almost as resilient as before.
