The Effects of Hyperosmolar Dextrose and Autologous Serum Injection in the Experimental Articular Defect of Rabbit

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: Although the clinical effects of prolotherapy on osteoarthritis has been reported, there have been few previous studies showing the effects as a proliferant on articular cartilage. Also the autologous blood has been reported to used as a growth factor stimulant recently, we were trying to use dextrose and autologous serum for tissue regeneration respectively and evaluated the proliferative effect of autologous serum comparing with that of dextrose. METHOD: Twenty four rabbits were used for this study. The rabbits were divided into three groups. Group A did not get any special treatment. Group B was treated with 10% dextrose and group C with autologous serum. Six weeks later, gross appearance and histologic findings were evaluated. RESULTS: After sacrifice, the gross inspection of the knee joints revealed that group B and C were filled with the translucent tissue in defective cartilage. Group A still had defective cartilage. Histologic evaluation revealed increase of cellularity in the defect of the injected specimens when compared with the control. There was no morphological difference between group B and C. CONCLUSION: The repair process of the articular cartilage defects using dextrose and autologous serum were shown to be more effective than that of control group.