Role of platelet-rich plasma in ischemic heart disease: An update on the latest evidence.

Myocardial infarction is the most common cause of congestive heart failure. Novel strategies such as directly reprogramming cardiac fibroblasts into cardiomyocytes are an exciting area of investigation for repair of injured myocardial tissue. The ultimate goal is to rebuild functional myocardium by transplanting exogenous stem cells or by activating native stem cells to induce endogenous repair. Cell-based myocardial restoration, however, has not penetrated broad clinical practice yet. Platelet-rich plasma, an autologous fractionation of whole blood containing high concentrations of growth factors, has been shown to safely and effectively enhance healing and angiogenesis primarily by reparative cell signaling. In this review, we collected all recent advances in novel therapies as well as experimental evidence demonstrating the role of platelet-rich plasma in ischemic heart disease, focusing on aspects that might be important for future successful clinical application.