INJECTIONS FOR PLANTAR FASCIITIS
Do you have heel pain or find it hard to stand & walk in the mornings? Well this may be your solution. Prolotherapy is an innovative injection technique developed in 1930s as an effective treatment for treating most chronic injuries- including plantar fasciitis. It is an elegant refinement of the centuries-old sclerotherapy which produced scar tissue to stabilise joints and relieve pain.
The body has an amazing ability to heal itself, however due to ligaments, tendons, and cartilage having a poor blood supply relative to other tissues; they can be slow to heal. But with prolotherapy, it’s as if you’re tricking your plantar fascia into healing itself. Prolotherapy involves injecting deposits of a solution of dextrose (sugar water) and local anaesthetic around the plantar fascia to act as a local irritant to cause low-grade and local inflammation at these tissues- this then triggers the healing cascade.
This increases protein and collagen formation, and thereby increases cell proliferation (replication). Prolotherapy also increases the infiltration of white blood cells and macrophages as well as stimulating the body to produce platelet-derived growth factors and interleukin-1β (chemical building blocks). All of these processes work to improve plantar fascia strength, mass, thickness and a trend toward an increase in cell number which increases function and reduces pain.