If you’re coping with an acute or chronic sports injury, you know how frustrating it can be waiting for it to heal. In fact, you might be wondering if you’ll ever be able to participate in your sport again at your pre-injury level.
Dr. Silva, a physiatrist and interventional orthopedic specialist, offers a pioneering treatment that can get you back on the playing field faster than ever. Platelet-rich plasma, or PRP, is a groundbreaking procedure that improves and speeds up your body’s ability to heal after an injury.
PRP is the secret weapon for a number of elite athletes. Tiger Woods and Rafael Nadal are among the stars who credit PRP treatment for helping them return to competition more quickly.
How PRP heals you
PRP is an outpatient, nonsurgical procedure that uses your own blood platelets to stimulate tissue repair the injured part of your body. Your healthy platelets contain growth factors, which play an important role in helping your body heal.
During the PRP treatment, Dr. Silva injects a concentrated serum into your injured tissue that contains a healthy concentration of your platelets. The serum is up to 15 times more concentrated than in your bloodstream, giving it rapid healing and rebuilding properties.
You can expect a number of benefits from PRP treatment along with tissue repair and strengthening. The effect can include pain relief, increased joint stability and mobility, stronger joints, and prevention or even reversal of joint degeneration.
What PRP treats
PRP therapy is an effective treatment for nearly any sports injury. With some injuries, you can receive PRP as an alternative treatment to more-invasive surgical options.
Injuries that Dr. Silva treats using PRP include strains and sprains, injured bones, osteoarthritis, nerve pain, and inflammation. PRP works on both acute and chronic injuries. In addition, PRP has anti-aging properties that can improve the health of your skin.
What to expect at your procedure
Your outpatient PRP procedure takes place at Dr. Silva’s office in Bellevue, Washington. At the start of your appointment, Dr. Silva draws blood from your arm.
Next, Dr. Silva uses a centrifuge to separate your platelets from the remaining parts of your blood. Using the platelets and a small portion of your plasma, he creates a healing serum that is concentrated exactly to your needs.
After creating the serum, Dr. Silva injects it into and around the injured part of your body. Your body begins the healing cascade in three phases, inflammatory phase, proliferative phase, and remodeling phase. Typically, this can take 6 weeks but each person responds differently.
If you’re eager to heal your body and return to the athletic activities you love, PRP treatment can accelerate your recovery. Dr. Silva provides this powerful procedure at Interventional Orthopedics of Washington.
To make an initial appointment with Dr. Silva to learn more about PRP, request to schedule online or call our office.