Knee Potion: Like An Oil Change For Your Joints

MIAMI (CBS4) – If you suffer from knee pain but you're not wild about the idea of surgery, there is an alternative.

It's Hyaluronic Acid, a natural fluid that's found in rooster combs, and marketed under a number of names, including Synvisc and Supartz. It's part of a procedure that's called Viscosupplementation.

A viscous fluid is injected into an arthritic knee, adding extra lubricant to the joint fluid which reduces inflammation.

Golfer Mark Borden said he didn't want to be one of those guys walking around with a new hip or knee in his 50s. But with his knee pain, walking the links was getting pretty tough.

"When I'm carrying my bag on my back, it causes a lot of pain in the left knee," said Borden.

Instead of steroid injections or knee replacement surgery Mark chose Synvisc.

"Hyaluronic acid is a substance your knee naturally makes," said orthopedist Sam Akhavan.

"What we try to do is pick patients that do not have too much arthritis, but yet, you know, have a little bit. Those are the people that probably have the most benefit from it. With his activity level, and the mild degree of arthritis that he has, I think he would do very, very well from these injections," Dr. Akhavan said. "This is another tool that we have in an effort to try to avoid more extensive surgery, such as a knee replacement."

If that's the worst part of it, that's not so bad," Borden said after the first of three shots.

He wanted to play golf right away, but had to take it easy for at least 24 hours.

While the treatment is available with just one shot, the amount of fluid required can be uncomfortable.

Since the idea is to kick-start the body's own production of lubricant, three injections, a week apart, give more of a chance for this to happen.

"Typically most of my patients, by the third shot are starting to see some difference, and typically when I see them back four weeks later, that's when I see most of the difference," Dr. Akhavan said.

"I have some patients where we do one series and that's all we do, and I have some patients where we do a series and it doesn't really work. So, it's variable who it's going to work with, but you know, I think six months is a reasonable amount of time to get good pain relief."

It's important to mention that about two percent of people can be allergic to the fluid.

Borden felt fine except for extreme dizziness for a few days after each injection, which is something essentially unheard of.

"This is actually the first time I've heard of someone having vertigo after this," Dr. Akhavan said. "We'll keep an eye on it, and if it continues, I may have him evaluated to see if there's anything else going on."

A week after his last dose, Borden was back to his old self.

"No crunching, no grinding," he said. "It's like, 'Wow, I haven't carried my bag in six months. I can carry my bag again.'"