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Treatment of Inflammatory Joint Conditions in Malmo

A doctor looks at your case and tests first, then PRP and SVF cell therapy can become part of arthritis care for the knee, hand, shoulder or other joints

Consultation and review of your scansFree

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Knee joint: regenerative treatment without surgery
Joint treatment without surgery. Free consultation and review of your scans

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What it is

What is arthritis
and when does this treatment fit?

Arthritis is the name for joint inflammation. Pain that comes at rest and at night, morning stiffness that persists beyond half an hour, swelling, redness and warmth over the joint are the classic signs. Causes vary, from autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid or psoriatic arthritis to gout, infection or an old injury.

  • No surgery — an injection instead of an operation
  • Own tissue — your blood and adipose tissue
  • Ultrasound guidance for every injection
Knee joint: an injection under ultrasound guidance

Who the treatment suits

Your scans are reviewed and you are examined before a doctor decides whether the treatment suits you

Suitable

A doctor reviews knee X-rays with a patient
  • Pain, crunching or stiffness in a joint
  • Painkillers only help for a short time
  • Recovery after injuries and surgery
  • You need a second opinion on your scans
  • You want to avoid or postpone joint replacement
  • Early or moderate arthrosis or arthritis
  • High load on the joints — sport or physical work

Not suitable

A doctor examines a patient's knee
  • Cancer
  • Pregnancy
  • Blood clotting disorders
  • Acute infections, including infection in or near the joint
  • Flare-up of a serious chronic illness
  • Temporary contraindications: fever, flu or a cold, or inflamed skin over the joint being treated

Not sure the treatment is right for you?

Leave your number — the coordinator will ask for your scans (X-ray, MRI or ultrasound), and the doctor will tell you whether treatment without surgery suits you.

Find out if it suits me

What we treat

Conditions we treat

How it works

How the procedure goes: step by step

Consultation and scan review1

Consultation and scan review

First comes an examination of the joint and a look at your X-rays, MRI or ultrasound; then the doctor decides whether the procedure fits your case. Existing scans can be sent before the visit.

Blood sample for PRP2

Blood sample for PRP

A vein provides a small amount of blood, which is later used to prepare platelet-rich plasma rich in growth factors.

Adipose tissue sample3

Adipose tissue sample

Under local anaesthetic, a small portion of adipose tissue (about 30 ml) is taken through a puncture on the abdomen or inner thigh. No stitches are needed.

Processing in a centrifuge4

Processing in a centrifuge

The sample is spun in a centrifuge and separates into layers. The stromal vascular fraction is isolated and mixed with the platelet-rich plasma.

Injection into the joint5

Injection into the joint

The prepared material goes directly into the affected joint, with ultrasound guidance helping to place it accurately.

Follow-up6

Follow-up

Without crutches and without a hospital stay: after the procedure the doctor stays in touch and follows the joint's response.

Book a consultation

Call or message us — our coordinator will contact you shortly and book your consultation

A doctor talks with a patient about joint treatment
Book a consultation
A doctor talks with a patient about joint treatment

Results

After the procedure

  • Doctor talking warmly with a patient after the procedure

    1 week

    The joint may ache a little more — this is an expected reaction.

  • Doctor consulting an older patient one month after treatment

    1 month

    The pain usually eases.

  • Doctor explaining progress to a patient using a knee joint model

    ~3 months

    Mobility and activity improve.

  • Doctor and patient walking together at a follow-up visit

    ~6 months

    The full effect develops.

How long it lasts differs from person to person and depends on the stage of the condition, body weight, activity and other factors — no one can promise a fixed result.

Comparison

Methods we use

Only material from your body — your blood and adipose tissue — and nothing synthetic or from a donor

Cell therapy (SVF) from your own adipose tissue

The stromal vascular fraction (SVF) — a blend of cells involved in repairing tissue — is isolated by processing a small sample of your adipose tissue. Mixed with your own plasma, it goes into the affected joint by injection.

A doctor explains SVF cell therapy for the knee to a patient on a tablet

In inflammatory arthritis, after the acute flare has passed, it is chosen for how it acts on local inflammation and tissue repair.

Material
Your adipose tissue and plasma
How it is given
Into the joint, under ultrasound
Duration
The whole procedure is done in one day.

PRP — platelet-rich plasma from your own blood

Injected into the joint, plasma rich in platelets and growth factors — separated from a small amount of your blood — helps calm inflammation and makes conditions for tissue repair better.

A doctor explains PRP therapy for joints to a patient on a monitor

It may be recommended for rheumatoid and other inflammatory arthritis as one part of the overall treatment plan.

Material
Your blood from a vein
How it is given
Into the joint, under ultrasound
Duration
The whole procedure is done in one day.

The benefits and timings shown are averaged and given for guidance: the plan and recovery depend on your joint and individual features, and the doctor confirms them at the consultation.

At the consultation the doctor will review your scans and suggest a treatment plan

Free consultation

Book a consultation

Joints

Joints we treat

Large or small joints: once your scans are reviewed, the doctor picks the joint, the method and the number of injections

  • KneeKneePain on stairs or after walking, cartilage wear and meniscus problems
  • HipHipEarly hip osteoarthritis, groin pain, limited rotation
  • ShoulderShoulderWear in the joint and the tendons around it, painful arm raising
  • ElbowElbowWear of the joint surfaces, and pain after overuse or strain from sport
  • Hand and wrist jointsHand and wrist jointsFinger and wrist small joints that are stiff and painful
  • AnkleAnklePain and stiffness after sprains and old injuries

Advantages

Why patients choose City Medical Centre

We work on keeping your own joint rather than replacing it — treatment without surgery

Your own tissue

Your own tissue

Only material from your body — your blood and adipose tissue — and nothing synthetic or from a donor

No crutches

No crutches

Punctures, not incisions; local anaesthetic; and rehabilitation that is not long

Second opinion

Second opinion

For a free, independent doctor's assessment, send us your X-rays, MRI or reports

Support after the procedure

Support after the procedure

Staying in touch after the procedure, we follow the outcome and not only the injection day

About the clinic

A clinic where you can feel at ease

Modern equipment, comfortable rooms and care for every patient

A doctor and a patient at the clinic

Contact us the way that suits you

We will answer your questions and find a convenient time for a consultation

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Request a free call

Price

Arthritis treatment prices

The cost is set after the consultation: it depends on which joint, which type of arthritis and which method

FAQ

Joint treatment: frequently asked questions

About the conditions

More about these conditions

Other services of our clinic

Arthritis treatment in Malmo: a short guide

Arthritis treatment in Malmo uses your own tissue: platelet-rich plasma from a small blood sample and the stromal vascular fraction from a small adipose tissue sample. There is no donor or synthetic material.

Most patients in Malmo go home the same day and return to normal daily activity within a day or two. During the first week the joint may ache a little more — this is an expected reaction.

The price depends on how many joints are treated and on the method. For patients from Malmo, the doctor explains the plan and the cost at a free consultation.

Reading a Malmo year through an inflamed joint

Malmo lies at 12 m above sea level on the Oresund strait in Skane County, and its weather is mild but damp. In the 1991-2018 normals, January has a mean maximum of 2.9 °C and a mean minimum of -1.4 °C. February is almost identical at 3.0 °C and -1.5 °C, and December is slightly milder at 4.8 °C and 0.7 °C. Relative humidity averages 80.7% across the year, and annual precipitation is about 673 mm. Snow falls mainly from December to March, but the cover is brief and some winters have none. So the cold months here are less about deep frost and more about grey, humid days around freezing.

People with inflammatory arthritis often wonder whether this kind of weather makes their joints worse. The honest answer is that it differs from person to person, and a single winter month proves nothing. What helps is evidence from your own body. Warmth, swelling and redness over a joint, night pain, and morning stiffness lasting longer than half an hour are the signs that matter most. If you note them week after week, a pattern either appears or it does not. Perhaps your hands are stiffest in the wettest weeks, or perhaps the weather makes no difference and the real trigger is an infection, a stressful month or a change in medication. The doctor can only judge that if there is a record to read.

Summer in Malmo is a useful comparison period. July brings a mean maximum of 23.2 °C and a minimum of 13.8 °C, and August is 22.3 °C and 13.7 °C. The city has about 1,918 hours of sunshine a year, with May, June and July each around 270 hours, while December has only about 33 hours. If you log symptoms across a full year, you get a real comparison between the dark, humid months and the bright ones. That is more convincing than a guess made in the middle of a bad week.

Keep the idea simple. The weather is one column in your notes, next to sleep, activity, illness and medication. It is not a verdict.

A symptom diary a doctor can actually use

A good diary is short enough to keep up when you are in pain. Write one entry a day, at roughly the same time, and use the same words each time. The following points are worth recording:

- Which joint is affected, and whether it is on one side or both.

- How long the morning stiffness lasted. The threshold that matters in inflammatory arthritis is longer than 30 minutes, so write down whether you passed it.

- Whether pain woke you at night or was present at rest, since that points to inflammation rather than simple wear.

- Whether the joint was visibly swollen, red or warm to the touch.

- What you took for the pain and how long the relief lasted. Painkillers that only help briefly are one reason people ask about other options.

- Any fever, cold, flu or skin inflammation over the joint. These are temporary reasons to postpone any joint injection, so the doctor needs to know about them.

Then add context. Malmo gives you plenty of ordinary markers: a long cycle to work, a football match, a swim at Ribersborg in summer, a busy week during Malmofestivalen in the third week of August, or a long Midsummer weekend. The city has 410 km of cycle paths, and a large share of everyday trips are made by bike. If you cycle daily, note any change in how your knees, hips or hands feel after the ride. High load from sport or physical work is one of the details the doctor considers when choosing a plan.

Date your flares clearly. The treatment described on our service text is applied only after an acute flare has calmed. It is never done during a severe flare or an active joint infection. If your diary shows when a flare began, when it peaked and when it eased, the doctor can see whether the joint has reached a calmer stage. That timing is a medical decision, and the diary supports it without replacing it.

A paper notebook is enough. A phone note works equally well, and so does a photo of the swollen joint taken in the same light every few days. Photos are easy to send to the coordinator on WhatsApp or Telegram.

Waiting-time rules and specialist access in Skane

Sweden has a national waiting-time rule called 0-3-90-90. In plain terms, you should get contact with primary care on the same day, a medical assessment within three days, an appointment with a specialist within 90 days, and treatment within 90 days of the decision to treat. Regions may set shorter limits. For someone with a swollen, stiff joint, this framework explains what to expect from the public system, and it gives you something concrete to refer to when you ask about timing.

Costs in Skane follow a fee-per-visit model. There is a set fee for a visit to a health centre or specialist outpatient clinic, a higher one for the emergency department, and a ceiling on what you pay for outpatient care over twelve months. Under age 20 and from age 85 there is no fee. Certificates, vaccinations and inpatient daily fees are usually outside the ceiling. If you have frequent appointments for a long-term joint condition, it is worth checking how close you are to that ceiling, because the 1177 information service explains how it works.

Where does an online consultation with City Medical Centre fit? It sits alongside the public pathway and does not replace it. Rheumatoid arthritis and psoriatic arthritis are systemic diseases that a rheumatologist treats, and PRP and SVF injections do not cure them. Psoriatic arthritis in particular cannot currently be cured completely, so the aim is long remission, with inflammation kept in check and joint deformity prevented. Regenerative injections may be one part of that plan once an acute flare has settled. Keep your rheumatology appointments and your prescribed medication exactly as they are, and use the online conversation as an extra, independent assessment of the joint.

The first consultation and the review of your scans are free, and you have no obligation to go further. If you are waiting for a specialist slot and want an informed view of your X-rays, MRI or ultrasound in the meantime, this is a low-pressure way to get one.

Files and questions for the video call

Start with the imaging you already have. X-ray, MRI or ultrasound reports are all useful, and so are the images themselves if you can obtain them. You can send them before the consultation so the doctor reviews them in advance. Add recent blood test results, a list of your current medicines, and a note of which joint bothers you most. The doctor selects the joint, the method and the number of injections only after going through your scans, whether the joint is large or small.

Be ready to describe three things in your own words:

1. What type of arthritis you have been told you have. It might be rheumatoid, psoriatic, gout-related, or a joint damaged by an old injury.

2. Whether your last flare is over, still ongoing or recently treated.

3. Whether any of the following applies: cancer, pregnancy, a blood clotting disorder, an active infection in or near the joint, a fever, cold or flu, or skin inflammation over the joint. These stop or postpone the procedure.

Coordinators answer round the clock on WhatsApp and Telegram, and the stated reply time for the free online consultation is within 15 minutes. You can send files in the same chat and ask the coordinator what the doctor will want to see.

It also helps to know the procedure itself. PRP uses platelet-rich plasma prepared from a small amount of your own blood. SVF is the stromal vascular fraction, isolated from roughly 30 ml of your own adipose tissue taken under local anaesthetic through one puncture on the abdomen or inner thigh, with no stitches. After processing in a centrifuge, the material is injected into the joint under ultrasound guidance. The whole procedure is done in one day, with no crutches and no hospital stay.

Results are described in averages. After about a week the joint may ache a little more, which is an expected reaction. Around a month the pain usually eases, at about three months mobility and activity improve, and by about six months the full effect develops. How long it lasts depends on the stage of the condition, body weight, activity and other factors, and nobody can promise a fixed outcome. Write your own questions down before the call, because that is when the doctor can discuss realistic expectations for your type of arthritis.

A busy, cycling city and the question of joint load

Malmo is the third-largest municipality in Sweden. At the end of 2025 it had 367,924 inhabitants, up by 2,280 (0.6%) over the year. The urban area covers about 80.67 km2, and the wider metropolitan population is around 780,000. It is also a student city: Malmo University, Lund University's medical faculty units, several art academies and the World Maritime University all operate here. For a young adult with new joint swelling, or a person in midlife with a physically demanding job, the daily routine can be full, and joint symptoms are easy to put off.

Sport is part of the city's identity. Malmo FF plays in Allsvenskan, FC Rosengard has won the women's league ten times, and the Malmo Redhawks play in the SHL ice hockey league. Whether you play, coach or only watch, activity is a useful thing to put in the diary. The service text lists recovery after injuries and surgery, and a high load on the joints from sport or physical work, among the situations where the treatment may be considered. It also lists conditions such as knee, hip, shoulder, elbow, hand and wrist, and ankle problems. An old sports injury that has turned into a stiff, swollen ankle is one of the causes of arthritis the text names.

The calendar matters too. Sweden's public holidays, including Midsummer, and de facto days off such as Midsummer Eve, Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve, can slow ordinary appointments. If you plan a procedure, remember that after the injection the doctor keeps in touch and follows how the joint responds, so choose a time when you can report back without interruption. Because contact runs on messaging and video, the follow-up does not depend on opening hours or a visit to a waiting room.

If your joint symptoms are new, you do not need to wait for a clear diagnosis before sending a message. Describe what you have noticed, attach what you hold, and the doctor will say whether treatment without surgery could suit you, or whether another route comes first.

Does Malmo's damp winter make arthritis flares more likely?

The service text does not link flares to weather, and the evidence is individual. Malmo's winters are humid, with relative humidity around 80.7% a year and January averages close to freezing, so many people notice how they feel in those months. The best approach is to record weather beside your symptoms for a full year and let the doctor judge whether a pattern is real.

How long should I keep a symptom diary before booking an online consultation?

You do not need a long record to start. A week or two of daily notes on night pain, morning stiffness over 30 minutes, swelling, redness and warmth is already helpful. You can send the notes to the coordinator on WhatsApp or Telegram and keep adding to them while you wait for the doctor's reply.

Can I use the free consultation while I wait for a rheumatology appointment in Skane?

Yes. The national 0-3-90-90 rule sets a limit of 90 days for a specialist appointment, though regions may set shorter limits, and you can use that time to get a free review of your scans. This does not replace your rheumatologist. Systemic diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis stay under that specialist's care, and the injections are only a supplement.

Do I need to stop my arthritis medication before PRP or SVF?

Do not change any prescribed medicine on your own. The service text describes PRP and SVF as working alongside, not instead of, a rheumatologist's care. Tell the doctor exactly what you take during the consultation, and any decision about medication stays with the specialist who prescribed it.

What if I have a flare on the day of the planned procedure?

Tell the coordinator straight away. The procedure is never done during a severe flare or an active joint infection, and a fever, cold, flu or skin inflammation over the joint are temporary reasons to postpone it. The doctor will move the date to a calmer period instead of going ahead.

Are the 12-month cost ceiling and visit fees in Skane relevant to an online consultation?

They apply to public outpatient care, such as visits to a health centre or specialist clinic. The first consultation and scan review with City Medical Centre is free, and the cost of any treatment is given by the doctor after the consultation. If you are close to the public ceiling because of frequent visits, 1177 explains what is and is not included.

Which files are most useful to send from Malmo before the call?

X-ray, MRI or ultrasound images and their written reports are the most useful, along with recent blood test results and a list of your medicines. Add a short diary of your flares and note which joint hurts most. The doctor will go through these and tell you whether treatment without surgery suits you.

Is it realistic to expect results by the next summer season?

The averaged timeline in the service text runs from a slightly sore joint in the first week, through easing pain at about a month and better mobility at about three months, to the full effect at about six months. It differs between people and no fixed result can be promised. The doctor will discuss what is realistic for your type and stage of arthritis.