‘PAINLESS’ WHOLE BODY PROLOTHERAPY
Ross Hauser, M.D.

How can Prolotherapy be made ‘painless’?
When I started working with Gustav Hemwall, M.D., most of his clients received intravenous Demerol. Demerol is a narcotic, like morphine. It is a great pain reliever. So for the last 15 years I have been using various intravenous medications to help people get Prolotherapy over large areas relatively pain free. You feel pressure while the Demerol is working but generally the pain from the Prolotherapy needles is not felt.

Prolotherapy can also be made ‘painless’ by premedicating with substances like xanax and vicodin. Some patients use ultram or Tylenol before the treatments. The majority however just get the Prolotherapy done, unless they are going to get a lot of areas done. If this is case, then some type of pain medication is typically taken. For those that are tough, they take medication by mouth, for the rest of us mortals (me included) give me a shot of Demerol!

Do people really get whole body Prolotherapy?
Yes. Some people suffer pain in many areas of their body and get many of their joints injected at one time. Some people spread it out over two days. Many of these patients are athletes. They have injured various areas over the years and now have ankle, knee, low back, neck, middle back, and shoulder pain. Now doing all these areas may not technically be ‘whole body’ Prolotherapy but the person will end up with 250 shots. I would say that amount qualifies.

What types of cases get whole body Prolotherapy?
People with body pain will only get relief if the root cause of the problem is addressed. For instance if a person has the flu and their whole body hurts, doing whole body Prolotherapy will just make them hurt more. What they need is rest, heat (yes lots of covers), immune system stimulants (like echinacae), vitamin C, and to breathe tea tree oil (7 drops in boiling water and steam breathe).

People who have injuries to the joints, ligaments, tendons, and other joint structures because of accident, overuse, trauma, or genetics (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome) need Prolotherapy. I have done whole body Prolotherapy treaments on soccer players, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, benign congenital hypermobility, Fibromyalgia and multi-trauma clients.

Is Prolotherapy the only treatment modality for whole body pain?
A person needing whole body Prolotherapy, needs all the help they can get. Typically it is recommended that they get some blood work to make sure they are eating correctly and have a hormonal make-up for healing. The body responds best if it is in an anabolic (healing) state versus a degenerative state. So we do blood hormone testing, Diet Typing, and food allergy testing (blood test). Food allergies can cause a lot of body pain. Imagine if every day you have a couple of eggs but you are allergic to them. Guess what could result long term? You've guess it body pain! People with fibromyalgia typically need a comprehensive natural medicine program and some of them will need whole body Prolotherapy. Most fibromyalgia patients I see have some body pain but typically a few areas that make up the majority of their pain. These are the areas that first get Prolotherapy. If they respond well, then other areas are treated.

Prolotherapy
Prolotherapy involves the treatment of two specific kinds of tissue: tendons and ligaments. A tendon attaches a muscle to the bone and involves movement of the joint. A ligament connects two bones and is involved in the stability of the joint.

A strain is defined as a stretched or injured tendon; a sprain, a stretched or injured ligament. Once these structures are injured, the immune system is stimulated to repair the injured area. Because ligaments and tendons generally have a poor blood supply, incomplete healing is common after injury. This incomplete healing results in these normally taut, strong bands of fibrous or connective tissue becoming relaxed and weak. The relaxed and inefficient ligament or tendon then becomes the source of chronic pain and weakness. The basic mechanism of Prolotherapy is simple. A substance is injected into the affected ligaments or tendons, which leads to local inflammation. The localized inflammation triggers a wound healing cascade, resulting in the deposition of new collagen, the material that ligaments and tendons are made of. New collagen shrinks as it matures. The shrinking collagen tightens the ligament that was injected and makes it stronger. Prolotherapy has the potential of being 100 percent effective at eliminating and chronic pain due to ligament and tendon weakness, but depends upon the technique of the individual Prolotherapy doctor. The most important aspect is injecting enough of the solution into the injured and weakened area. If this is done, the likelihood of success is excellent.