Walking the Great Wall of China: A PRP Story

Not too long ago I had the opportunity to sit down with a gentleman by the name of Travis, and ask him about his recent Platelet Rich Plasma (PRP) injection. 

To say his story was unlike all the others I’ve heard would be an understatement. I was so impressed with his story that I asked if I could share it. Here is his story in his own words:

“When I was in high school, I was a football player. I played running back on our high school football team and had taken a hit—a helmet to the ankle on a real vicious tackle. I never really did anything with that ankle, and slowly over the years it started to get worse and worse.nI ended up transitioning and playing rugby in college. I got to the point in rugby where I really couldn’t plant on my left foot and cut hard to the right. I had to play one side of the field. I went to have an MRI on my ankle and it turned out that I had a 1-inch-square cyst on my ankle. And all the bone surrounding that cyst was getting a lot of arthritis in the joint space. The surgery for feet just didn’t appeal to me whatsoever. I’ve not met too many people who had foot or ankle surgery that got their full function back. So I just ignored my pain for many years.nBy the time I was an adult, my pain got to a point where I couldn’t walk up or down steps without significant discomfort or pain. It would get flared up and I just couldn’t do it. If I had to, I’d have to use the railings to take all the weight off my ankle.nI couldn’t play tennis or soccer anymore. Any lateral movement was really starting to hurt me. I ended up getting a PRP treatment in my ankle. They took out a little bit of my blood and spun it down to create this PRP. I was a little bit nervous that it was going to hurt but to my surprise it was completely pain-free. They numbed up my ankle and then injected it with the PRP and it was literally pain-free.nThe results from that treatment, over the next few months were unbelievable. I didn’t think that one shot of something could fix all this arthritis in my ankle. Seven months after my treatment I went to Asia with my wife and we climbed the Great Wall of China. We did 66,000 steps that day and there was no pain whatsoever. So if I was going to put this treatment to the test, that was one heck of a test to use. I believe in the therapy whole heartedly.”

In talking to patients about their procedures, this would be one of the most positive results I’ve seen. Travis had subsequent injections that continued to heal the arthritis in the ankle and highly recommends PRP therapy to anyone looking for an alternative to surgery. As you know, the results from these PRP therapies vary, but to think PRP isn’t a valid option to permanent relief for chronic and acute pain conditions would be a mistake.