Autologous chondrocyte implantation repairs damaged cartilage with your own cultured cartilage cells.
About 30 min
About 2 cm
Local
Day after surgery
Discharged next day
After stitch removal
Where bones meet at a joint, there is articular cartilage, which absorbs shock and keeps the joint moving smoothly.
However, once this cartilage wears away, localized degenerative changes begin, and damaged cartilage cannot regenerate.
In such cases, taking into account the extent of cartilage damage and the patient's physical condition, autologous chondrocyte implantation (ACI) may be performed: some of the patient's own healthy cartilage cells are harvested and implanted into the damaged area.
In ACI, some of the patient's own healthy cartilage cells are harvested, multiplied several hundredfold in a special process, and then implanted into the damaged area.Because your own cartilage is used, recovery with healthy cartilage can be fast, and side effects and rejection reactions are rare.
For patients aged 15 to 55 with articular cartilage damage, who unlike older adults need to stay active after surgery, ACI is recommended over joint replacement, which lasts about 15–20 years. The cartilage defect must be between 2 and 15 cm² in size, and the cartilage next to the damaged area must be relatively healthy.
A small amount of healthy cartilage is harvested arthroscopically from a part of the joint that is used little.
The harvested cartilage is sent to a cell processing facility and cultured for about 6 weeks. The 12–15 million successfully cultured cartilage cells are mixed with a fibrin adhesive and injected so that they settle into the damaged area.
