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Orthopedics/Sports
From joint damage to regeneration
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For millions of people, cartilage damage can lead to chronic pain, limited mobility and require difficult decisions about surgery. Unlike bone, cartilage has little ability to heal itself, leaving many patients with treatment plans that require multiple procedures, lengthy rehabilitation or, eventually, joint replacement. But what if damaged cartilage could be encouraged to repair itself?
In this episode of "Tomorrow's Cure," orthopedic researchers from Mayo Clinic and Mass General Brigham discuss RECLAIM, an investigational regenerative medicine approach designed to help restore damaged cartilage. The approach uses a patient's own cartilage cells combined with specialized donor cells that help create a healthier environment for healing. Rather than simply filling damaged areas, RECLAIM aims to support the body's natural repair process in a single procedure instead of multiple surgeries.
Host Lindsey Sievert talks with Daniel B.F. Saris, M.D., Ph.D., and Mario Hevesi, M.D., Ph.D., orthopedic surgeons at Mayo Clinic and Christian Lattermann, M.D., chief of the Division of Sports Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital and director of research for Mass General Brigham Sports Medicine. Together, they discuss why cartilage injuries have challenged orthopedic medicine for decades and how advances in cell biology, minimally invasive surgery and artificial intelligence (AI) are creating new possibilities. They also explain how collaboration across specialties helped adapt the RECLAIM technology from the knee to the hip, why preserving a patient's natural joint is especially important for active people and what researchers still need to learn before treatments like RECLAIM become more widely available.
The conversation also explores the future of regenerative medicine, including how AI could help identify patients most likely to benefit from these therapies and how insights from this research may eventually extend beyond cartilage to other tissues throughout the body. While RECLAIM remains under clinical investigation, the episode offers an inside look at how scientific discovery and patient collaboration are shaping the next generation of orthopedic care.
Listen to the latest episode of "Tomorrow's Cure" wherever you get your podcasts. You can also explore the show's full library of episodes and guests on the show's playlist.
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