Treatment of Knee Osteoarthritis with Autologous Expanded Bone Marrow Mesenchymal Stem Cells: 50 Cases Clinical and MRI Results at One Year Follow-Up

Knee osteoarthritis is one of the most prevalent joint diseases, causing pain, function loss and disability, leading to a progressive cartilage degeneration induced by biochemical changes in its composition. Current available treatments focus on addressing symptoms and joint replacement is the last treatment option. Advanced therapies with mesenchymal stem cells build new expectations to improve the results of OA treatments. MSC applied in animal models, show encouraging results in modulating inflammation and joint cartilage repair. Several studies applied autologous mesenchymal stem cells to treat knee osteoarthritis in humans by means of an intra-articular injection. Our team previously conducted a pilot study applying 40×10e6 autologous bone marrow expanded mesenchymal cells in 12 patients affected with knee osteoarhtritis through intra-articular infusion. After 2 years we obtained excellent clinical and quantitative MRI outcome measures, no adverse events reported.