# What to ask about blood-based care *Blood-Based Treatment Choices — Biologic Therapy Tempe* > A short biologic therapy guide to PRP, concentrated PRP, other non-surgical care, and questions to ask before choosing an option. One joint can keep aching after the rest of you feels fine. Rest settles it for a while, but the soreness returns with use. That is often when unfamiliar treatment names start coming up. The important part is what each choice would involve for you. ## What does PRP mean, and does PRP work? Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) starts with your own blood. The clinic spins the sample and keeps plasma with more platelets, the small blood parts used for treatment. That prepared plasma is placed at the sore joint. Concentrated PRP is made with a larger amount of platelets. Clinics can prepare PRP with different platelet amounts. Some preparations also keep more white blood cells than others. Those changes may affect early soreness and swelling. Ask the provider to describe the preparation offered to you. Research doesn't give one sure answer about relief. Some people say their ache eases, while careful studies sometimes found little difference. Studies haven't shown that PRP rebuilds worn cartilage. Decide in advance what amount of relief would matter to you. ## What to ask QC Kinetix about your options QC Kinetix offers regenerative treatments, meaning clinic care made with blood taken from you. The team places the prepared blood at the sore area without joint surgery. Its medical providers are health care staff who check your joint and explain the choices. This option is meant to calm soreness and make daily movement easier. Ask the provider to name everything used in the treatment. Find out how the treatment day will unfold from start to finish. You'll also want the full price and recovery details. Don't agree until each answer makes sense to you. ## How to weigh alternatives to knee or hip surgery Non-surgical care includes more than one kind of help. Exercise, shorter activities, heat, cold, or medicine may come first. Natural pain treatments is another name for options using blood taken from you. The exam will help sort which choices fit the reason for the ache. Severe joint wear can limit how much these options help. Ask whether your earlier X-ray shows that much wear. When a doctor has mentioned surgery, ask what waiting might mean for daily movement. You don't need to answer during that talk. ## How to ask which orthobiologic has the strongest evidence An orthobiologic is body material prepared for use at a sore joint. PRP is one kind, not the name for every treatment. PRP has more research than many other choices in that group. Even so, no study can promise relief for you. Ask which option matches your exam. Then ask why the provider favors it for your soreness. A plain answer matters more than a long sales talk. Take more time if the answer isn't clear. ## Sources 1. RESTORE, the largest and most rigorously blinded placebo-controlled PRP trial in knee OA (n=288, participant-, injector- and assessor-blinded), gave three weekly injections of a commercial leukocyte-poor PRP or saline. At 12 months the change in knee pain was -2.1 vs -1.8 points (difference -0.4; 95% CI -0.9 to 0.2; P=.17) and the change in medial tibial cartilage volume was -1.4% vs -1.2% (difference -0.2%; P=.81). Twenty-nine of 31 prespecified secondary outcomes showed no between-group difference. The authors concluded the findings do not support the use of PRP for knee OA. Bennell KL, et al. — [Effect of Intra-articular Platelet-Rich Plasma vs Placebo Injection on Pain and Medial Tibial Cartilage Volume in Patients With Knee Osteoarthritis: The RESTORE Randomized Clinical Trial.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34812863/). *JAMA*, 2021. DOI: 10.1001/jama.2021.19415. 2. A meta-analysis of 34 RCTs (1,403 PRP knees vs 1,426 controls) found WOMAC favoured PRP over placebo at 12 months and over hyaluronic acid at 6 and 12 months, and favoured PRP over steroids on VAS pain, KOOS pain, daily function and quality of life at 6 months. Crucially, the authors state that the superiority of PRP DID NOT REACH the minimal clinically important difference for any outcome and the quality of evidence was low. Filardo G, et al. — [PRP Injections for the Treatment of Knee Osteoarthritis: A Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32551947/). *Cartilage*, 2021. DOI: 10.1177/1947603520931170. 3. A Bayesian network meta-analysis of 48 Level I-II randomized trials (9,338 knees) with a minimum 6-month follow-up ranked the four commonest intra-articular injections. HA and PRP both significantly improved pain versus placebo; HA, PRP and BMAC all significantly improved function versus placebo. SUCRA rankings were PRP 91.54, BMAC 76.46, HA 53.12, corticosteroid 15.18 and placebo 13.70 - corticosteroid ranked barely above placebo at six months and beyond. Jawanda H, et al. — [Platelet-Rich Plasma, Bone Marrow Aspirate Concentrate, and Hyaluronic Acid Injections Outperform Corticosteroids in Pain and Function Scores at a Minimum of 6 Months as Intra-Articular Injections for Knee Osteoarthritis: A Systematic Review and Network Meta-analysis.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38331363/). *Arthroscopy*, 2024. DOI: 10.1016/j.arthro.2024.01.037. 4. A fragility-index analysis of the RCTs underpinning PRP for knee OA (1,993 patients) found the mean number of outcome events needed to reverse an individual trial's statistical significance was only 4.57, and 8.67 for the pooled meta-analytic effects. On meta-analysis PRP did show an advantage over hyaluronic acid (OR 2.19) and higher rates of achieving the MCID for pain versus alternatives (OR 6.19) - but the conclusions rest on a small number of events, which is the technical way of saying the literature is not robust. Oeding JF, et al. — [Platelet-Rich Plasma Versus Alternative Injections for Osteoarthritis of the Knee: A Systematic Review and Statistical Fragility Index-Based Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38420745/). *American Journal of Sports Medicine*, 2024. DOI: 10.1177/03635465231224463. 5. The largest head-to-head trial of cell-based orthobiologics to date randomised 480 patients with KL II-IV knee OA across four arms: autologous bone marrow aspirate concentrate, autologous adipose stromal vascular fraction, allogeneic umbilical cord tissue-derived MSCs, and a corticosteroid injection control. At 12 months NONE of the three orthobiologic injections was superior to another or to the corticosteroid control on either co-primary endpoint (VAS pain, KOOS pain), and none of the four groups showed a significant change in MRI osteoarthritis score from baseline. No procedure-related serious adverse events were reported. Mautner K, et al. — [Cell-based versus corticosteroid injections for knee pain in osteoarthritis: a randomized phase 3 trial.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37919438/). *Nature Medicine*, 2023. DOI: 10.1038/s41591-023-02632-w. 6. A phase III double-blind placebo-controlled trial of a SINGLE injection of culture-expanded autologous adipose-derived MSCs in 261 patients with KL grade 3 knee OA found significantly better VAS pain (25.2 vs 15.5 mm improvement; P=.004) and total WOMAC (21.7 vs 14.3; P=.002) at 6 months versus placebo, with no serious treatment-related adverse events - but MRI showed NO significant difference in cartilage-defect change between groups. Culture-expanded cells of this kind are a drug in the United States and are not available outside a trial. Kim KI, et al. — [Clinical Efficacy and Safety of the Intra-articular Injection of Autologous Adipose-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells for Knee Osteoarthritis: A Phase III, Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37345256/). *American Journal of Sports Medicine*, 2023. DOI: 10.1177/03635465231179223. 7. The 2025 Cochrane review of stem cell injections for knee osteoarthritis pooled 25 randomised trials (1,341 participants) and found that, compared with placebo injection, stem cell injection MAY slightly improve pain (1.2 points better on a 0-10 scale, 7 studies, 445 participants) and function (14.2 points better on a 0-100 scale, 7 studies, 432 participants) up to six months - both rated LOW-certainty evidence, downgraded for indirectness (cell source, preparation and dose varied across studies) and suspected publication bias, since up to three larger RCTs were conducted and withdrawn before reporting results. Radiographic progression was not assessed in any included study. Whittle SL, et al. — [Stem cell injections for osteoarthritis of the knee.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40169165/). *Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews*, 2025. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD013342.pub2. 8. The only randomized controlled trial of alpha-2-macroglobulin for knee osteoarthritis allocated 75 patients with KL grade 2-3 disease to A2M-rich concentrate, conventionally prepared PRP, or methylprednisolone, with 12-week follow-up. The A2M group improved significantly from baseline on VAS, WOMAC, KOOS and Tegner; the PRP group improved on none; the steroid group improved on Lysholm only. Critically, the CHANGE in scores did not differ significantly between the three groups - A2M was comparable to, not better than, PRP and corticosteroid. Thompson K, et al. — [The Effectiveness of Alpha-2-Macroglobulin Injections for Osteoarthritis of the Knee.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39259950/). *Bulletin of the Hospital for Joint Diseases*, 2024. 9. A JBJS systematic review screened 420 papers on intra-articular cellular therapy for knee OA and focal cartilage defects and found only SIX studies at Level III evidence or higher, covering 300 knees, with wide variation in cell source, cell characterisation, adjuvant therapy and outcome assessment. All six reported improvement and no major adverse events, but the authors concluded the improvement was modest, a placebo effect could not be disregarded, and no consensus exists on indications, cell sources, preparation or delivery. Chahla J, Piuzzi NS, et al. — [Intra-Articular Cellular Therapy for Osteoarthritis and Focal Cartilage Defects of the Knee: A Systematic Review of the Literature and Study Quality Analysis.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27655978/). *Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (American)*, 2016. DOI: 10.2106/JBJS.15.01495. 10. The BMJ meta-analysis of viscosupplementation pooled 169 trials (21,163 participants) and found clear evidence of small-study effects and publication bias. In the prespecified main analysis of 24 LARGE placebo-controlled trials (8,997 participants) hyaluronic acid reduced pain by SMD -0.08 (95% CI -0.15 to -0.02), equivalent to 2.0 mm on a 100 mm scale - far below the -0.37 minimal important difference - and trial sequential analysis showed there has been CONCLUSIVE evidence of clinical equivalence to placebo since 2009. Fifteen large trials showed a significantly higher risk of serious adverse events (RR 1.49). Pereira TV, et al. — [Viscosupplementation for knee osteoarthritis: systematic review and meta-analysis.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36333100/). *BMJ*, 2022. DOI: 10.1136/bmj-2022-069722. ## What to do when you want the joint checked General advice can't tell you what causes this ache. An exam checks movement, swelling, strength, and tender areas. Bring old reports and your current medicine list. QC Kinetix offers visits with its medical team. Biologic therapies means the team draws your blood, prepares part of it there, and places that part at the sore area. You may also hear the names natural pain treatments or regenerative treatments for this blood-based care. These non-surgical choices aim to calm soreness and make movement easier. No one knows exactly how you will respond. Ask about the price, recovery, and the next step if treatment doesn't help. Decide when you're ready. Call (602) 837-PAIN for any of the four Valley locations. Book a free consultation: --- Plain answers for an aching joint. Biologic therapy Tempe guidance on sore joints, home relief, warning signs, and options using blood taken from you at QC Kinetix. Plain help for joint soreness and your next step. This site is operated by the owners of the QC Kinetix clinics serving the Phoenix area — Chandler, Scottsdale, Peoria and Banner Estrella — so the people grading this evidence are also the people who benefit when you book, which is precisely why every figure here names the study behind it and links to the source. © 2026 Tempe Evidence Ledger. General education about how joint research is graded, not medical advice about your own joint — take that to a clinician.