Ayobami S Ogunsola, Davis J Brady, Hailey K Bennett, John B Gordon, Ryan Zhang, Marcel G Brown, Edward C Beck, Chukwuweike U Gwam, Xue Ma
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引用次数: 0
Abstract
Background and objective: Tendon injuries are common musculoskeletal conditions that affect both athletic and working populations. Although surgical intervention remains the mainstay of treatment for large tendon injuries, conventional approaches often result in suboptimal healing and functional outcomes. Recent evidence has shown that stem cell therapy may play a role in the management of these injuries. This review comprehensively examines the current literature on stem cell applications in tendon regeneration by analyzing both preclinical and clinical evidence. Specifically, we evaluated various stem cell populations, their characteristics, delivery mechanisms, and repair processes. Additionally, we addressed the limitations of stem cell-based therapies while highlighting emerging trends and future research directions in this rapidly evolving field.
Methods: PubMed was searched for articles published in August 2025. Boolean operators "Tendon" OR "Tendon repair" OR "Tendon regeneration" OR "Tendon injury" AND "Scaffold" AND "Secretomes" OR "Exosomes" OR "Stem Cells" were used to search for articles. Inclusion criteria included studies within the last 10 years, performed on humans or animals, written in English, as well as articles considered clinical trials, meta-analyses, randomized controlled trials, reviews, or systematic reviews. We identified approximately 1,800 studies, which were screened for relevance to our topic. Additional reference screenings and targeted searches were performed to identify other relevant studies.
Key content and findings: With advancements in regenerative medicine and material science, new solutions, such as the integration of stem cells and growth factors with specialized scaffolds, offer innovative solutions for tendon regeneration. Various stem cell populations, including mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), tendon-derived stem cells (TDSCs), and perinatal stem cells (PSCs), have demonstrated potential for assisting in tendon repair. However, significant challenges persist regarding ethical considerations, safety protocols, and treatment standardization.
Conclusions: Stem cell therapy represents a promising frontier in tendon healing, with growing preclinical and clinical support for its regenerative efficacy.
期刊介绍：
The Annals of Translational Medicine (Ann Transl Med; ATM; Print ISSN 2305-5839; Online ISSN 2305-5847) is an international, peer-reviewed Open Access journal featuring original and observational investigations in the broad fields of laboratory, clinical, and public health research, aiming to provide practical up-to-date information in significant research from all subspecialties of medicine and to broaden the readers’ vision and horizon from bench to bed and bed to bench. It is published quarterly (April 2013- Dec. 2013), monthly (Jan. 2014 - Feb. 2015), biweekly (March 2015-) and openly distributed worldwide. Annals of Translational Medicine is indexed in PubMed in Sept 2014 and in SCIE in 2018. Specific areas of interest include, but not limited to, multimodality therapy, epidemiology, biomarkers, imaging, biology, pathology, and technical advances related to medicine. Submissions describing preclinical research with potential for application to human disease, and studies describing research obtained from preliminary human experimentation with potential to further the understanding of biological mechanism underlying disease are encouraged. Also warmly welcome are studies describing public health research pertinent to clinic, disease diagnosis and prevention, or healthcare policy. With a focus on interdisciplinary academic cooperation, ATM aims to expedite the translation of scientific discovery into new or improved standards of management and health outcomes practice.
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