FAQs ORTHOPAEDICS & SRT

The auricular cartilage encompasses a series of advantages that make it the ideal donor site for the biopsies. In the first place, the auricular cartilage is formed by elastic cartilage which is the most similar cartilage to the hyaline one found in movable joints (knee for example). Moreover, micrografts from the auricular cartilage are easy to collect which makes AMT® easy to perform. And most importantly, ear’s inner layer of perichondrium contains a higher number of chondroprogenitor cells, key to the success of the AMT® in Orthopaedics. 

A thorough history of prior injuries, treatments, and procedures can be conducted. Locking, catching, clicking, or popping are common complaints from the knee and are suggestive of concomitant pathology. Acute injury, as opposed to chronic, is a relatively better prognostic factor for outcomes. Thus, AMT® could be particularly beneficial in post-traumatic sports injuries in athletes. Moreover, the protocol could be extended to other articulations besides the knee joint, such as the hip, shoulder and ankle.  

Grade 4 osteoarthritis is the most severe stage in osteoarthritis, cartilage is almost completely gone and decreased synovial fluid results in joint stiffness and highly reduced mobility. In these cases where there is no cartilage, it is difficult to expect regeneration, reason for which AMT® might not be as effective as in lower grades of osteoarthritis, and treatment would need a more conventional approach, like surgery. Nevertheless, an AMT® procedure could help with pain management in this kind of patients. 

In the context of knee chondropathy, with a single AMT® procedure we could expect a high reduction in pain and stiffness, resulting in an improvement in the patients’ quality of life (QoL) for as long as 3 years. In addition to improving QoL, there can be formation of new cartilage. This novel autologous micrograft procedure represents an innovative and accessible approach to the management of chondropathy.  

This approach could be expanded to different joints over the human body, it has been successfully used on the hip joint and ankle joint by using the same criteria. 

Depending on the condition and degree of joint degeneration, results can be seen within the first month and are sustained over time, with a significant reduction in joint pain and stiffness, improving knee-related mobility in patients with osteoarthritis and sports injuries.