(mellow jazz music)
- Hello, my name is Dr. Gavin Chan
from the Victorian Cosmetic Institute
and today I'll be talking about platelet-rich plasma.
Firstly, I'd like to talk a bit about platelets
and what their actual role is in the body.
Platelets are a natural part of our blood
and their role is to help clot blood,
say for example if you have a wound
platelets from the blood will rush that wound
and start the clotting cascade.
And as a part of that process what they also do
is release growth factors to help heal that wound.
So not only do they clot the wound
but they also release these factors
which begin the process of healing.
Traditionally, platelet-rich plasma has been used
for things like orthopedic injuries in elite athletes.
For example, if a footballer injures their knee
they may use platelet-rich plasma in their knee joint
to help speed their recovery
and let them get back on the field quicker.
In the cosmetic industry we use platelet-rich plasma
for skin rejuvenation and also to improve the healing times
from procedures such as laser, skin resurfacing,
or to help procedures such as fat transfer.
So how does platelet-rich plasma work?
Essentially what we're doing
is we're using your own platelets,
we're concentrating them, and we're placing them in an area
which needs to heal quicker or needs to be rejuvenated.
The first step is to harvest your own blood
and this is done just like a normal blood test.
The blood is then centrifuged
which basically separates the red blood cells
from the plasma.
The red blood cells are naturally heavier
and when centrifuged they go to the bottom of the test tube.
The plasma, which is lighter, is concentrated at the top.
So plasma is the part of the blood
which contains the platelets
and by centrifuging the blood
we're really getting a high concentration
of platelets in this plasma.
Okay, so the first step in platelet-rich plasma treatments
is the hosting of blood.
Now, we do this in a normal way.
It's just done like a normal blood test
and the amount of blood that's harvested
depends on how big the area is that you wanna treat.
So here we have whole blood
and what we're gonna do with this whole blood
is put it into a special vial.
Now these vials have special reagents
which help separate the red blood cells
from the platelet-rich plasma after centrifuging.
So I'll do that now.
Okay, and just recap that.
The next step is to centrifuge the whole blood
in the specialized vial and this will separate it
into platelet-rich plasma and the red blood cells.
We'll do this for about 10 minutes.
So now that the vial has been centrifuged
for about 10 minutes we can take it out
and what you end up getting
is this very interesting looking vial
where the blood has actually separated
into its major components.
The red blood cells have been trapped
in this special reagent down here and the plasma,
which contains a lot of these healing platelets,
is in the top section.
It's got a yellowish color.
The next step is to remove the platelet-rich plasma
and this can be done simply by using a needle and syringe.
Ordinarily in the body
the platelets are only activated when there's a wound
or when there's some sort of injury
to the blood vessel wall.
So these are non-activated platelets.
To active 'em what I do is actually mix this
with some calcium chloride.
And now this simulates the clotting process
or the beginnings of the clotting process in the body.
So now this will actually start to activate
and these platelets now can be injected
into an area where we need them.
So now that we've harvested this platelet-rich plasma
we can utilize its healing properties
by either injecting it in a certain area
and this will help rejuvenate skin,
help to reduce fine lines, improve skin texture,
or we can use it as a healing tool
after something like laser skin rejuvenation
where the skin may be slightly raw and healing
and this will actually speed the process along
by injecting it in this area.
Another cutting edge treatment for platelet-rich plasma
is its use in fat transfer.
Fat transfer is the transfer of fat
from one part of the body,
usually to certain parts of the face
such as the cheeks or around the eyes,
to help rejuvenate the face.
As a doctor performing the procedure
one of the concerns I have with fat transfer
is the survival rate of fat cells
once transferred to the face.
Often there's a certain percentage of fat cells
which survive and a certain percentage
which don't survive the transfer process.
Now what I've found
is that by combining platelet-rich plasma with fat
before the transfer I'm getting a higher survival rate
of these fat cells, which means fewer treatments
and a better overall outcome.
So in summary, platelet-rich plasma is a treatment
using the healing properties of platelets
from your own blood to help rejuvenate skin
and also to help the healing process
from cosmetic treatments.
(mellow jazz music)