Stem Cell Therapy used successfully locally

Stem cell therapy is growing in popularity.

There are claims that using stem cells to treat a variety of ailments produces amazing — even miraculous results.

Seven years ago Ed Gulbransen began walking for 30 minutes on the treadmill every morning. His doctor at that time said it was important for him to walk for his circulation after he got blood clots in his leg.

“About three of four months from the end of the year my knees got so bad I couldn’t do it and that was a concern to me because it was causing other problems,” Gulbansen said.

Gulbransen was looking at knee replacement surgery, but then a doctor recommended he try stem cell therapy first. He did.

“And now I ‘ m able to walk again. I’m able to kneel. I couldn’t put any pressure on my knees when knelt down and now I can. It’s been great.”

Dr. Gary Walker performed the stem cell therapy on Gulbrandsen. Gary and his brother Eric both trained at the Mayo Clinic and are specialists in physical medicine and rehabilitation.

They’re excited about the use of stem cell therapy.

“This whole regenerative movement is trying to do things for patients that either assist the body or initiate the body’s healing reaction, ” Walker said. ” So these are methods that try to avoid surgery, trying to get patients off medications and truly help the body help itself.”

Dr. Gary Walker knows what he’s talking about from personal experience. He has arthritic knees that would typically require a knee replacement.

“But three-and-half years ago for my knees I had injections done then, ” Walker said. ” In fact, at the time I was getting ready to do knee replacement surgery and went ahead and had a colleague of mine do injections into my knee, and I went from having a hard time mowing my own lawn to literally being able to walk 10 to 12 miles on flat ground without too much difficulty at all.”

Earlier this year Walker had his brother, Eric do stem cell therapy on him for his shoulders and to re-do his knees.

Eric explains how it was done.

“It’s a fairly simple procedure, ” Walker said. ” We just place a needle in an area and numb up the skin, and then take a little bit larger needle and make a little poke and pull this needle and go back and forth and pull off some of the fat tissue. It truly is a liposuction type of technique though this is not looked up as a cosmetic procedure. We don’t extract enough fat to probably make a big difference. And then take that tissue and process it in a way that we’re able to extract some of the cells in that fat tissues that help our body to heal itself.

Gary explains how those stem cells from fat were injected in his knee.

“If it’s knee arthritis we might come in straight through the knee and literally lay that needle into that joint that’s arthritic and inject the solution into there, ” Walker said.

With some ailments stem cell therapy may resolve the problem. In others it’s a shorter term solution.

“For me at my age if I can even prolong having a knee replacement for another five years or another 10 years then that puts me out further from having a repeat knee replacement in the future,” Walker said.

Whether is solves the problem for ever or just buys a few years time, people like Ed Gulbransen are just happy to find some relief through stem cells.

“Enjoy hiking and doing the things that I love, ” Gulbransen said. ” I enjoy the outdoors and doing those things any more so this is bringing a greater joy for me and for my family.” >

The bottom line karole is that for some the results are phenomenal and for others less dramatic but it’s a lot less that surgery in terms of cost.

Unfortunately it’s considered experimental so insurance does not yet cover it. Studies on the internet say in the United States a stem cell injection on the knee is generally around $3,000 to $5,000. Knee replacement surgery is around $50,000.

More information on stem cell therapy can be found at Walker Pine and Sports Specialists at https://www.walkerspineandsport.com/