Do patients have their surgery performed at Rush Hospital in Chicago?
Dr. Cole: Yes, they get operated on at Rush. We use the procedures that are done at many other institutions, but we are trying to consolidate them under one decision-making process in order to perfect the algorithm as we go along. We are collecting data using the most stringent indications for these procedures, making sure that we at least respect the indications as we currently understand them in the orthopedic community and apply these to select the various procedures for patients with appropriate problems. The types of procedures that we are doing are the arthroscopic washing out of the joint; microfracture, which is a technique that induces fibro-cartilage to form in areas with localized cartilage loss; autologous chondrocyte implantation, often in patients with large defects who have failed primary treatment; osteochondral autograft procedures, where we take plugs of bone and cartilage from relatively non-weight bearing areas of the knee and transplant them to weight-bearing areas
