In recent years, doctors have learned that the body has the ability to heal itself. Platelet-rich plasma therapy is a form of regenerative medicine that can harness those abilities and amplify the natural growth factors your body uses to heal tissue.
The idea is that injecting PRP into damaged tissues will stimulate your body to grow new, healthy cells and promote healing. Because the tissue growth factors are more concentrated in the prepared growth injections, researchers think the body’s tissues may heal faster.
In recent years, PRP has become a "trending therapy" in aesthetic medicine. Aesthetic providers are using the natural healing properties of platelets to improve the appearance and overall health of skin.
But while PRP procedures are growing in popularity, the research supporting their clinical effectiveness is limited.
Thus despite many studies reporting promising results, the true value of these procedures remains open to question. To date, the question of whether PRP's cocktail of growth factors generates a more youthful appearance has not been definitively answered. However, PRP injection appears to be safe, with a low complication rate.
They acknowledged, however, that the treatment is controversial, noting that small sample sizes and low quality of research were among the limiting factors of their investigation.
Although PRP procedures are considered exempt from FDA regulation, studies done at various institutions around the world have been conclusive enough to offer concrete results. As more studies continue to be released, PRP’s applications in the fields of cosmetics, orthopedics, wellness, and regenerative medicine will continue to expand. With all the data I collected and read, the jury is still out on whether PRP is really the "fountain of youth." However, PRP continues to grow in the aesthetic market and it doesn't look like it's slowing down anytime soon either.
My experience with PRP has mostly been with cosmetics. I've used it in areas I would normally inject fillers into. I've also used it in conjunction with micro-needling and for hair loss in the scalp. Overall I've seen some pretty impressive improvements of skin texture and hair re-growth. But you need to understand that it does take multiple treatments of PRP to get the results that it promises to deliver.