What is Regenerative Medicine?

The goal of regenerative medicine is to restore, repair and/or improve damaged tissue, utilizing different types of biologics. Kevin Pauza MD has a specific interest in utilizing biologics to repair torn and herniated spine discs, as well as helping patients who have tissue injuries pertaining to their shoulders, knees and hips. Because of the rise in regenerative medical techniques in orthopedics, many are calling this type of medicine “Orthobiologics”.

Orthobiologics are causing a much-needed paradigm shift in the orthopedic community, stopping many unnecessary surgeries, while offering hopeful, long-term, non-invasive solutions.

Historically, patients suffering with low back pain and/or sciatic pain were put into what we refer to as “the mill”. In the mill, patients are offered short term relief through procedures such as corticosteroid injections and nerve ablations which often lead to short term relief, or in other words, put a “band aid on the wound”. Once these procedures fail to offer any long term relief, patients are often placed on opioids to help with their symptoms. Ultimately, when the patient has gone through the mill, with no relief, they are directed towards surgery. For example, if one were to look at the outcomes of spinal fusions, one would recognize they have poor outcomes. It’s disappointing that patients in these mills are pushed towards surgery before being offered an Orthobiologic option which are showing to have promising, long-term outcomes.

Biologics help repair certain tissue, whether damaged or degenerated, that previously had difficulty healing on their own. The advancements in regenerative medicine are very exciting.  For example, by use of stem cells, researchers have successfully grown new heart valves from human cells, making the need for some transplants moot. It’s very exciting to think that less than 20 years ago, options such as this were not available, much less possible.

Dr. Pauza has created a biologic procedure called Discseel that is meant to a seal torn, herniated disc with a natural substance called fibrin. Past animal studies revealed fibrin not only sealed the torn disc, but also instigated new growth of disc tissue. We see patients with constant low back pain and neck pain who have been through the “mill” and are in need of a back-pain treatment that doesn’t just treat their symptoms, but rather, fixes the problem. Dr. Pauza’s alternative treatment to back surgery is a simple disc injection of a natural biologic called fibrin, meant to help seal and heal torn spinal disc.