Procedure Heals Damaged Tendons Without Medicine

By now, the medical benefits of water are clear – and quite numerous. But here’s a relatively new one: shooting it out of a needle at high pressure to clear damaged tissue out of a tendon while preserving the healthy tissue around it.

It’s called the TenJet procedure, as Chelsea Evans, DO, primary care and sports medicine physician with Lehigh Valley Orthopedic Institute, explains.

“It’s relatively minimally invasive,” Dr. Evans says. “It removes damaged tissue without injecting any medication, such as cortisone, to help facilitate healing in the tissue.”

“The procedure uses hydrodissection,” says Faisal Al-Alim, MD, primary care and sports medicine physician with Lehigh Valley Orthopedic Institute. “We insert a needle into the area of the tendon, and then we use a high-powered saline stream to clear away the damaged tissue.”

Because healthy tissue is strong enough to withstand the strength of the water stream, it remains intact while the weaker damaged tissue is dislodged.

“TenJet then sucks out the damaged tissue and the liquid,” Dr. Al-Alim says. “Most people don’t even require stitches.”

Lehigh Valley Orthopedic Institute recently obtained the equipment needed for the TenJet procedure at the request of Dr. Evans, who had used it during her fellowship training, observing its benefits firsthand.

“It can help and is covered by most insurances,” Dr. Evans says. “Plus, it’s not using any external sources of medication to influence tissue healing.”

This is important, because using a modality like cortisone, for instance, can damage the tendon.

“With [TenJet], you’re not hurting any tissue; you’re just getting rid of what’s damaged,” Dr. Evans explains. “It’s offering another option that gives long-term relief for tendinopathies.”

According to Dr. Al-Alim, TenJet is a great option for people experiencing tendon pain who haven’t gotten relief from more conservative modalities.

“It’s usually used for people presenting with chronic tendinopathy,” Dr. Al-Alim says. “This includes lateral epicondylitis, plantar fasciitis, Achilles tendinitis and patellar tendinitis.”

If a person hasn’t responded to physical therapy or steroid injections, TenJet may be a good next step. And because of the minimally invasive nature of the procedure, recovery is swift.

“You’re uncomfortable for the first week or two,” Dr. Evans says. “Around the four-week mark is when you start feeling the benefit of the procedure. And then it just goes up from there.”