New AKC Health Foundation Funded Study - CCL Rupture - Plasma Collagen

[frontier]

University of Wisconsin - Madison
Use of a platelet rich plasma-collagen scaffold to stimulate healing of cruciate rupture in dogs

"Current surgical treatments are stabilization procedures that do not directly treat the damaged or ruptured ligament. Our main goal is to develop a safe and effective therapy that will prevent progressive tearing of ligament fibers, enable ligament healing, and block arthritis progression in affected dogs."

http://www.akcchf.org/research/funde...arch/1762.html

[awclark]

Boy, that sure would be nice to have a non surgical successful treatment.

[Jay Dufour]

They wanted to do that to my shoulder ...at 900.00 per shot......

[Howard N]

They wanted to do that to my shoulder ...at 900.00 per shot......

If it works, it's worth it!

I've just had shoulder surgery. Four procedures one operation, $23 something K, plus the rehab. Not fun!

[Chad Baker]

I am pleased to see the AKC health foundation helping to fund this research.

[EdA]

The results should be interesting but the amount of the grant may not be large enough to do a large scale study. They do not identify how cases are to be selected or what procedure(s) will be used to verify CCL injury. If they only do late stage unstable stifles I would not expect to see much efficacy. Hopefully they will identify and follow a significant number of early stage strains or partial tears where PRP might actually be of great benefit. I have surgically observed enough unstable stifles with complete tears and often associated meniscal tears to be skeptical that any type of regenerative therapy will be successful. Additionally to really evaluate efficacy those cases should be followed for 2 or more years which will probably not happen due extended time to complete the study and cost.

Anyone truly should consider a donation to AKC Canine Health Foundation specifically targeted for this study.

[Jay Dufour]

Insurance ( human) will not pay anything toward it....experimental they indicate.

[frontier]

The results should be interesting but the amount of the grant may not be large enough to do a large scale study. They do not identify how cases are to be selected or what procedure(s) will be used to verify CCL injury. If they only do late stage unstable stifles I would not expect to see much efficacy. Hopefully they will identify and follow a significant number of early stage strains or partial tears where PRP might actually be of great benefit. I have surgically observed enough unstable stifles with complete tears and often associated meniscal tears to be skeptical that any type of regenerative therapy will be successful. Additionally to really evaluate efficacy those cases should be followed for 2 or more years which will probably not happen due extended time to complete the study and cost.

Anyone truly should consider a donation to AKC Canine Health Foundation specifically targeted for this study.

I agree and would be nice to see a write-up in the RFTN or on their web site publicizing this study as well as the retriever community donating to the study given how many of us owning performance retrievers have been impacted.