A new hope in the fight against osteoarthritis, one of the most widespread and disabling joint diseases in the world. A research team from the Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies - Pisa and the IRCCS Rizzoli Orthopaedic Institute in Bologna, in collaboration with research centers and European companies, has taken a promising step toward developing regenerative therapies capable of restoring function and well-being to damaged joints.

First Italian orthopaedic hospital and eighth in the world in the specific ranking of Newsweek. It is the result obtained by the Rizzoli Orthopaedic Institute of Bologna in the annual ranking of the US magazine dedicated to the best hospitals distinguished by specialties.

Osteochondral lesions of the ankle (i.e. lesions affecting the articular cartilage and the underlying bone, usually due to trauma), are often treated in a "biological" way in young patients: damaged tissues are regenerated by using the patient's own stem cells. 

However, this option is only valid for young patients with a limited size of lesion. Biological cartilage reconstruction is no longer effective, with increasing age, in case of excessively large and deep lesions or failed surgical treatments.