Amazing Interview With Dr. Hauser, Part I: “About 1/3 Of Soft Tissue Injuries Don’t Heal…”
Get the mp3 audio version here – Dr. Hauser Interview Part I
Note: You can also check out Part II and Part III.
Dr. Ross Hauser is one of the medical world’s pioneers when it comes to revolutionary treatment for curing chronic pain and soft tissue injuries. He is most well known for his expertise in prolotherapy, having been trained by Dr. Gustav Hemwall, the grandfather of prolotherapy. He is the medical director and co-founder of the Natural Medicine Clinic, Caring Medical and Rehabilitation Services in Oak Park, Illinois, which can also be found at http://www.caringmedical.com.
[Dr. Hauser is a fitness enthusiast. Here he is competing in an Ironman.]
He has also written multiple books, including the national best seller “Prolo Your Pain Away! Curing Chronic Pain with Prolotherapy” and more recently “Prolotherapy: An Alternative to Knee Surgery”, I managed to land an interview with Dr. Hauser, and ask him about soft tissue injuries, prolotherapy and platelet rich plasma therapy or prp. It’s an in-depth three part interview, and this is part one. Here’s what Dr. Hauser had to say:
Rafi: What are soft tissue injuries?
Dr. Hauser: Soft tissue injuries are injuries to tendons, ligaments, meniscus, and labral tissue. These tissues are made up of collagen. Collagen makes up 1/3 of the human body, so injuries such as a rotator cuff tear, a ligament sprain, tendon tear, tendon injury, tendinosis which is a degenerated tendon, a degenerated meniscus, a meniscal tear, a degenerated labrum or a labral tear.
These kind of injuries respond great to prolotherapy. Prolotherapy specifically is the injection of substances that stimulate the healing of soft tissue injuries so I think the treatment of choice for a soft tissue injury should be prolotherapy.
Rafi: I know one person who broke a bone, and it healed after 6 weeks. Another sprained her ankle, and a year later still has pain and instability. What’s going on?
Dr. Hauser: We all know folks who broke a bone and they’ve worn a cast or splint for 6 weeks and it healed and other folks who have a simple ankle sprain and months and months later they still have pain. What most folks don’t realize is soft tissues like ligaments have a very poor blood supply. Soft tissue such as tendons or ligaments – they actually appear white and the reason they appear white is their blood supply is terrible so they’re notorious for not healing.
About 1/3 of soft tissue injuries don’t heal even if a person rests them, does mild exercise, and does therapy. So these folks who have chronic soft tissue injuries, ankle sprains, or tendon strains that haven’t healed, should consider prolotherapy. Prolotherapy works great in those instances.
Rafi: What is prolotherapy? Is it dangerous?
Dr. Hauser: Prolotherapy, the scientific definition is the rehabilitation of an incompetent structure such as a ligament or tendon. I think a better definition is prolotherapy stimulates the body to repair painful areas, specifically as an injection technique where you’re using mostly natural substances to stimulate the body to repair the painful area.
The areas that respond very well to prolotherapy are when there are injuries to soft tissue such as tendons, ligaments, meniscus and labral tissue like in the shoulder. But we’ve also found that degenerative arthritis like when there’s cartilage degeneration or cartilage injury in the knee, the hip, the ankle – that also typically responds very well to prolotherapy.
Are there dangers? Prolotherapy is a very very safe procedure. In the various books I’ve written, sometimes I’ve mentioned that I believe prolotherapy is safer than taking an anti-inflammatory every day. I’ve often even commented that I think driving through Chicago to get to the office in Oak Park, Illinois is actually more dangerous than getting prolotherapy.
There is a small risk of infection with prolotherapy so we at Caring Medical clean the skin with antibiotic solution and obviously I recommend people go to a very skilled prolotherapist. Because the prolotherapist is obviously using needles to do the various injections you want to make sure the prolotherapist is skilled at where those needles are placed. But the substances themselves are very very safe. The typical solution that I use is a 15% dextrose 10% Sarapin and then it has a little bit of novacaine in it and honestly I could inject that solution right into one of my veins and I would be completely fine.
Rafi: Thanks Dr. Hauser for that incredible information. Stay tuned for Part II.
August 6th, 2009 at 1:35 am
[...] You can also check out Part I and Part [...]
August 8th, 2009 at 7:10 am
I have recently had my third shoulder operation (same shoulder). I injured the shoulder 15 years ago whilst climbing (I yanked it). It took 8 years to diagnose because doctors and physios were distracted by the more apparent body compensations such as neck stiffness and back pain. Once diagnosed, the operations began. I believe the first two were not successsful because I did not leave enough time for the wound to heal. I have learnt my lesson and now have my mind set on a 6-12 month recovery window (rather than the previous 4-8 weeks). I have two questions regarding Prolotherapy: If the operation has not stabalized the shoulder, would Prolotherapy be the next thing I should try? If the operation has stabalized the shoulder, will Prolotherapy help the current healing process?
August 16th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
Richard,
You need to discuss a question like that with your doctor. In my opinion though, I would say that prolotherapy would be what you try as an option before you get to surgery. It seems to me that after surgery you’ll want to wait before trying prolotherapy since it takes time to heal, but that’s something you’d have to discuss with your doctor and an accepted prolotherapist.
-Rafi