London Cartilage Clinic
Explore expert articles on cartilage care, regenerative treatments, and practical recovery advice from our specialist team.
Eligibility for ChondroFiller — an acellular collagen scaffold that recruits the body's repair cells — requires MRI-confirmed Grade III–IV cartilage damage and failed conservative treatment, not pain severity.
Microfracture creates fibrocartilage—softer scar tissue that fails under athletic pivoting—whilst osteochondral autografts transplant native hyaline cartilage; in young athletes, ten-year failure rates are 38% and 14% respectively.
Sixty-two per cent of moderate-to-severe hip osteoarthritis patients managed conservatively through structured exercise, weight loss, and education avoid joint replacement at twelve months; for those whom this approach fails, surgery delivers markedly greater functional improvement.
ChondroFiller delivers a collagen scaffold that gels at the cartilage defect, creating a stable environment where the body's own repair cells can settle and rebuild tissue.
Unloader braces increase medial knee joint space by 0.3mm during walking and elevate cartilage collagen and proteoglycan — evidence of genuine load-driven tissue preservation — though benefit is limited to isolated medial compartment osteoarthritis and only 28% of patients achieve regular use at one year.
Degenerative tears typically tolerate low-load walking on flat ground; acute tears with displaced fragments risk further damage to articular cartilage.
