Cartilage is an extremely valuable tissue, which covers all the large joint surfaces in human beings. It thus provides extremely efficient cushioning from high stress / load-bearing. Also, intact cartilage tissue, interacting with synovial fluid (joint fluid), allows finely-tuned sliding movement of the joint surfaces, which is absolutely essential for precise sequences of movement.

Note: Cartilage tissue consists of chondrocytes and ‘intercellular substance’, over 60% of which is water in young people and which is rich in collagen fibers and hyaluronic acid. This intercellular substance is principally responsible for the special mechanical features of cartilage tissue.

Why does cartilage heal so badly?

Cartilage tissue has extremely poor self-healing properties. One reason is that joint cartilage, unlike many other tissues, has no blood vessels. Almost all its nutrient supply comes from the synovial fluid, but this diffuses only slowly into the cartilage tissue. Even if the cartilage damage is as little as two millimeters in size, experience shows that in adults it has very little prospect of healing spontaneously.