Revolutionise Arthrofibrosis Diagnosis

Hi, my name is Dr. Kayley; I’m fundraising to research a new method to diagnose arthrofibrosis accurately. Early diagnosis and treatment are essential to prevent this crippling condition from becoming permanent, yet many people are never diagnosed or are misdiagnosed. We must do better than this, and we can with your help! Funds will be used to purchase a novel PET/CT tracer and to image patients. We hope to validate the method for diagnosis and for visualising the extent and location of fibrotic tissues. In the future, this method may provide a basis for selecting and testing treatments.

People with arthrofibrosis usually have chronic pain and stiff, restricted joint movement because of excessive internal scar tissue. This severely limits their ability to work, play and socialise, and even daily tasks are difficult or impossible. I know because I have had knee arthrofibrosis for more than ten years. Trauma deepens when people with arthrofibrosis are not believed by friends, family or treating clinicians, and they may even be blamed when aggressive treatments worsen symptoms. This disease can affect people of any age after injury or surgery, can affect any joint, and impacts around 10% of post-operative knees. Young sporting people who tear a knee ligament are over-represented in arthrofibrosis data.

We now have an opportunity to achieve a great deal with minimal funding! Thanks to senior researchers in nuclear medicine and rheumatology volunteering their time, equipment and skills, we don’t have to pay salaries to do this research; we only need to purchase the 68Ga-FAPI-46 PET/CT tracer and pay imaging expenses.

This new imaging technique can potentially transform the diagnosis, treatment and understanding of arthrofibrosis. We believe it will result in thousands of people every year who will avoid becoming permanently disabled like I am.

Every donation will help. If we successfully raise the funding and validate this imaging, it will be the first non-invasive method to directly visualise arthrofibrosis. It will permit the testing of desperately needed new therapies and the efficacy of existing treatments for the first time. Imaging will occur at the new Western Australian National Imaging Facility (NIF) Node at the Perkins Institute. Research results will be published in an international journal to ensure that this imaging becomes widely known and offered to patients. Any funds not used for research will be used for education. For more information, see https://arthrofibrosis.info