Blood Therapy Used by Tiger Woods Lures Everyday Athletes
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When Ira Schneider’s right hip started to hurt, the Los Angeles-based chiropractor wanted to avoid a repeat of the surgery he’d undergone on his left side, and the months of painful recovery that followed.
Instead, he turned to platelet-rich plasma therapy, better known as PRP, a treatment gaining ground after headlines touting its use by elite athletes including golfer Tiger Woods, tennis’s Rafael Nadal and basketball’s Kobe Bryant. Last week, Andrew Bynum, of the Philadelphia 76ers’ NBA team, said he’ll travel to Germany next month for the procedure, in which a concentrated dose of tissue-repairing platelets taken from the patient’s blood is injected into an injury site.