Table 1.

Comparison of clinical strategies with MSC-based therapies for cartilage damage treatment.

Strategy	Advantage	Disadvantage	Reference
Distraction	Increase joint space and reduce pressure in joint Significant improvements in pain and mobility of joint Technical simplicity Low cost	Pin tract infection Neuropraxia Thrombosis	Mastbergen et al.6
Autologous osteochondral implantation	Generally biocompatible in vivo Improved the prognosis of large size osteochondral defect	Largely invasive Graft separation	Daher et al.2
Allograft osteochondral implantation	Maintain the original structure for repaired tissue	Immune reaction Display variability among different samples Limited donor source	Daher et al.2
Autologous chondrocyte implantation	Appropriate phenotype required for cartilage repair Limited invasiveness Avoid potential immune complications	Dedifferentiation to fibroblast-like cells in monolayer culture Limited mitotic activity Two-stage operation	Djouad et al.4
Joint replacement	Metal prostheses provide excellent fracture resistance and mechanical strength Ceramic prostheses showed great osteoconduction ability	Metal toxic degradation products and immunogenicity Do not provide suitable microenvironment for tissue growth	Smith and Grande7
MSC-based therapies	Regeneration of a relative complete, functional cartilage tissue Can be modified and processed to desired specifications with consistent quality Relatively good biocompatibility and similar biomechanical properties with the target tissue	Increased complexity for fabricating Difficult to process in clinical practice	Zhu et al.63

MSC: mesenchymal stem cell.