With more and more surgeons and patients participating in the SAGE clinical study to evaluate the GelrinC™ Implant, you might be wondering: What exactly is the implant? In short, it’s the first biosynthetic hydrogel cartilage replacement, and designed to help reduce knee pain by filling in the damaged articular cartilage in the knee. But just how does it work? How is it made? The answers might surprise you.

Clinical Trial for Knee PainHere are 5 things you didn’t know about the GelrinC Implant:

  1. The GelrinC implant is composed in large of water, so that to be consistent with the watery nature of cartilage
    Articular cartilage is made with up to 80% water and GelrinC contains about 95% water.
  2. GelrinC harnesses a natural pro-healing protein that makes it body-friendly and a synthetic polymer that gives it its unique physical characteristics.
    GelrinC is composed of a synthetic material called polyethylene glycol (PEG) and a structurally modified form of human fibrinogen, a protein which in its native form assists healing processes. PEG and native human fibrinogen have been used individually in medical products for many years with excellent results.
  3. The GelrinC implant conforms to the shape of your damaged cartilage.
    GelrinC’s unique mode of action allows it to be implanted as a liquid so that it completely fills the cartilage defect in the knee, and then be cured into a gel that enables the body’s own stem cells to settle on its surface. Over a period of 6-12 months, GelrinC is gradually absorbed by the body and replaced by new cartilage tissue.
  4. GelrinC is the only cartilage repair implant that controls the quality of the newly formed tissue following a standard microfracture.
    GelrinC forms a dense gel in the body, which prevents undesired low-quality scar tissue from infiltrating into the defect. At the same time, the implant surface’s unique properties are ideal for stem cells to create cartilage, allowing cartilage to form. GelrinC will degrade gradually from its surface inwards, making space for cartilage to grow and completely fill the void.
  5. GelrinC has the potential to treat hundreds of thousands of patients per year.  
    Almost a million patients undergo arthroscopic knee procedures each year, of whom more than 400,000 patients are diagnosed with cartilage defects. There are no effective off-the-shelf treatment options for focal cartilage defects. GelrinC fills a current gap in the treatment of cartilage injuries and could treat hundreds of thousands of patients per year who are suffering with knee pain from damaged articular cartilage but are considered too young for knee replacement surgery.

To be eligible for the clinical study, you must be between the ages of 18 and 50 and have pain in only one knee. There also are additional criteria. If you have knee pain caused by damaged articular damage and would like to be considered for the study, please let me know by phone at 619-456-6012 or through this website here.   

CAUTION – Investigational device. Limited by United States law to investigational use.