Intra-articular injection of two different doses of autologous bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells versus hyaluronic acid in the treatment of knee osteoarthritis: multicenter randomized controlled clinical trial (phase I/II)

Lamo-Espinosa JM, Mora G, Blanco JF, et al. · Journal of Translational Medicine

High-dose (100M) group had the clearest gains: WOMAC improved ~16.5 points (P<.01) at 12 months and joint-space narrowing progressed in controls but not the high-dose group. Safe and feasible.

Population

30 patients with KL grade 2-4 knee OA, multicenter

Intervention

Culture-expanded autologous BM-MSCs (10 or 100 million cells) plus HA

Comparator

Hyaluronic acid alone

Limitations

Phase I/II with 10 patients per arm; unblinded; HA co-administered with cells confounds attribution.