Prolo Your Pain Away!
30. Nov, 2009 
5 Comments
In my last post, I introduced you to M.E.A.T—an acronym for the treatment of ligament and tendon injuries. I now want to elaborate on one of the treatment modalities mentioned in that posting—prolotherapy. Short for proliferation therapy, prolotherapy promotes inflammation through the injection of an irritating substance (usually a mixture of dextrose and lidocaine) into injured tissue. With the inflammatory process begun anew, growth factors in the blood migrate to the site of damage, encouraging new tissue production that strengthens lax ligaments and tendons.
Personally, I’ve had prolotherapy performed on three separate injuries—both ankles and a great toe. My first experience with prolotherapy was in 2006, to treat an an ankle injury that resulted in chronic pain, edema, and weakness. Following six treatments of prolotherapy, the pain and edema were gone, and I was able to complete my senior season of basketball without a single ankle sprain—something that hadn’t happened in 8 years!
A year later and another injury down, I turned again to prolotherapy to treat turf toe. This time the symptoms were different—acute pain and limited range of motion (I couldn’t even get my foot in a pair of heels for the lack of ROM…a very sad day indeed). After one treatment, the pain was gone and the ROM was back!
Guys and gals, the stories go on and on. Did I mention my neighbor who avoided knee-replacement surgery with prolotherapy? Or his wheelchair bound mother that was able to walk again? How about Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who attributed prolotherapy with extending his career?
If you suffer with joint or back pain, whether from acute injury or wear and tear, I highly recommend that you take a look at prolotherapy. What do you have to loose? When compared with surgery, prolotherapy carries vastly fewer risks and is significantly less expensive. Even if you aren’t looking at surgery, why live with chronic pain? Try something ‘new’ (relatively speaking—prolotherapy has been around for over 70 years).
Here’s an article from the New York Times that does an excellent job of summarizing prolotherapy and its uses.
I hope this helps someone, and I’m always here to answer questions!
Author Info
Where can you get this done in Austin?
Two doctors in Austin are certified to perform Prolotherapy, although I have not used them yet. Their info is below:
Brad Fullerton, M.D.
2714 Bee Caves Road, Ste. 106
Austin, Texas 78746
(512) 347-7246
http://www.proloaustin.com
David K. Harris, M.D.
Spine and Sports Solutions
4613 Bee Caves Road, Suite 105
Austin, Texas 78746
512-892-0490 Tel
512-892-0589 Fax
After calling both offices and looking at their educational backgrounds, my personal choice would be Dr. Fullerton. Although prolotherapy is not a complicated procedure, it does require a good knowledge of anatomy. Dr. Fullerton has been practicing prolotherapy for 10 years, which is a good bit of time. Although I do not know how long the other doctor has been performing prolo (his office staff didn’t know–that’s a red flag to me), I do know that Dr. Fullerton has been performing it longer.
You probably can’t go wrong either way, but experience is high on my list when choosing a doctor.
Just so you’re prepared, prolo does consist of a good amount of shots (that’s how that dextrose/lidocaine mixture gets into your ligaments/tendons), but you’re first numbed with a topical anesthetic and my MD in Nashville also used electrodermal stimulation to overload those sensory neurons. It wasn’t bad at all.
I love that you called the doctors’ offices. THANK YOU!
Prolotherapy is a great treatment. I have been practicing it for a number of ears now. Great results. Give it a try before you try surgery. I’m sure there are some people in Autin, TX. Google the american association of osteopathic physicians and they will probably have a few people on their locate a doctor that practive prolo.