No problem, here’s what I can tell you about rebuilding cartilage.
I’ve never been a part of these projects as it is not my field but I’ve heard some amazing breakthroughs. As you probably already know, for Cervical spondylosis your options fall into basic categories,
1) Surgical – usually only if the pain is unmanageable and the symptoms are progressive. This would include removal of bone and disk tissue and/or stabilization of the neck by fusing the cervical vertebrae.
2) Non-Surgical – e.g. physical therapy, a game plan of oral/ inoculated medications
3) Tissue engineering (advancements) – bio-medical engineering techniques to actually stimulate growth of the cartilage.
4) Alternative medicines – to protect the remaining and stimulate new cartilage through nutrients found naturally.
With respect to tissue engineering,
Dr. Steward from Illinois is currently wasit high in research that is focused on trying to figure out why there is a loss of cartilage cells with aging. He revealed that when a certain gene called cyclin D1 is turned off, cartilage cells are not able to multiply. He has shown that cell growth can be restored, at least temporarily, by using a compound that increases cyclin D1 expression. His goal is to use the ongoing research to produce new methods to stimulate growth in cartilage cells.
There are many that use the approach of alternative medicine. They stand by the use of glucosamine sulfate and anti-inflammatory herbs to decrease pain and increase mobility. Other anti-inflammatory herbs used in alternative medicines are ginger, curcumin or boswellia. Vitamin C is used to regulate proper connective tissue function.
Now back to the sulfate;glucosamine is a component of normal cartilage so many researchers believe that it can aid in helping the body help itself to repair damage of cartilage, but you must keep in mind that this is not a proven result, right now it is merely a plausible hunch. You said that you were being weaned off your NSAIDs so I’m hoping you have only good results so far with your anti- inflams.
Back to the medical arguments there is a Doctor in Oregon that believes the key is in the genetics. He is investigating genetic factors and genetic markers that may be able to manipulate stem cells from bone marrow into cartilage cells, this is still in the developing stages as far as I know, I’ll check up and see.
Now out of a natural sense of caution I’m going to add in this last part but remember that most patients with Cervical spondylosis are usually low key in terms of complications and are non-surgical. That said, if you do observe any new complications such as severe loss of movement or just loss of sensation of any area of the body, contact your doctor
immediately because this could be a bio-marker for something more serious.
A couple small tips you probably heard already,
Consume a lot of water (at least 8 glasses a day) during this time. All the supplements in the world won’t help you if you aren’t properly hydrated to absorb them.
Get some sun, seeing you are on this site that shouldn’t be a problem
Also, Vitamin C should be in your system constantly.
Yoga I agree is the next natural step, just take it easy, also with the swimming build your regime slowly, you don’t want to aggravate it more.
One thing you should always remember is that pain is your body’s way of saying “Stop that, stop it now
.”
So fight this but don’t push
too hard or it will push back.
Best of Luck,
