A Short history of Platelet rich Plasma

A new approach to self-care therapy was developed in the late 1990s by the US Professor of Surgery and Head of the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at the University of Miami, Robert E. Marx. Marx examined how bone grafts grow together faster and implants grow faster.

He found that blood-derived platelet-rich (platelet-rich) plasma increases the healing and growth of bones by up to 2.16 times and also increases bone density. [2] Use predominantly that 1% percent PRP, whose platelet concentration is about nine times as high as in normal plasma. These platelets release different growth factors as soon as they come into contact with skin, vascular or connective tissue cells. These include the platelet derived growth factors PDGFA, PDGF-B, PDGF-C and PDGF-D, the transforming growth factors TGF-beta 1 and TGF-beta 2, the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), the epidermal growth factor (EGF ) and the insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1).

Growth factors are usually activated by platelets in the event of injuries, stimulating, among other things, the cell division of fibroblasts and endothelial cells and thus contribute significantly to wound healing and cell renewal.

Thus, the PRP treatment is suitable as an accompanying curative procedure, especially in those areas of orthopedics, dental, oral and maxillofacial surgery, sports medicine, pain therapy and traumatology, in which tissue repair and wound healing should be supported or accelerated.

In ophthalmology, the PRP treatment is intended to reduce the pain after LASEK or LASIK surgery, reduce xerophthalmia and promote the regeneration of the cornea.

The cell-renewing and wound-healing effect of PRP is also used in aesthetic medicine and - as derived from the blood - under headings such as vampire or Dracula-Lifting headlines in relevant magazines. The whitish PRP, completely bloodless injected into the skin, stimulates the formation of new collagen, elastin and the body's own hyaluronic acid. Skin and connective tissue can store more moisture and are revitalized from within. Thus, the PRP treatment in aesthetic medicine and anti-aging helps to improve overall, younger skin appearance with fewer or less pronounced wrinkles.

In addition to the two-dimensional application as mesolift in the epidermal nappage technique, intradermal bolus injections or wrinkle injection in retrograde filler technique (in this case without the addition of citrate!) Are possible.

Another important application of PRP in medical aesthetics is the treatment of hair loss in men and women. Here, too, the four to six times repeated treatments help in most cases to new and stronger hair growth, as long as there are still living hair roots. [3, 4] In hair transplants, PRP is suitable as a medium to remove the extracted or transplantation in the short term. And like classic mesotherapy, the locally supporting PRP injection leads to a better growth rate.

A major difference between PRP application and classical mesotherapy with drug mixtures is in the larger time intervals. This means a longer impact duration of PRP, but the cost is about three times higher due to the time and material involved in PRP.

Whether curative or applied in aesthetic medicine, the benefits of PRP treatment are obvious: Patients like the idea that the remedy is derived from their own body. PRP can be quickly made using a centrifuge and applied within 20 to 30 minutes. The application follows the simple principle of mesotherapy: little - rarely - at the site of the disease. Allergies or intolerance reactions are excluded.