If your knees ache climbing stairs, your hip hurts when you get out of bed in the morning, or your hands stiffen up in the cold, you already know how much joint pain can take over your day. It’s not just the pain itself. It’s the things you cannot do because of it.
What most patients don’t know is that surgery is rarely the right first step for joint pain, and often isn’t necessary at all. Dr. Todd Koppel has been treating arthritis and joint pain in New Jersey for nearly 30 years, using targeted regenerative therapies, precise injections, and minimally invasive procedures. More than 95 percent of his patients find meaningful relief without surgery.
What Is Arthritis?
Arthritis is the breakdown of cartilage, the smooth tissue that cushions the ends of your bones inside a joint. When cartilage wears down, bones start rubbing against each other. That friction causes inflammation, swelling, and the deep aching pain that arthritis patients know too well.
The most common type is osteoarthritis, sometimes called wear-and-tear arthritis. It develops gradually over time and can affect virtually any joint in the body. It occurs in almost everyone.. It’s the accumulated result of time, activity, prior injuries, and genetics.
Symptoms of Arthritis
Joint pain from arthritis tends to follow a recognizable pattern:
- Stiffness that is worse in the morning or after a period of inactivity, then loosens up with movement
- Deep aching pain that worsens with activity
- Swelling or warmth around the joint
- Clicking, grinding, or cracking sounds when you move the joint
- Reduced range of motion over time
- Pain that worsens in cold or damp weather
Which Joints Does Dr. Koppel Treat?
Many pain practices focus narrowly on the spine. Dr. Koppel evaluates and treats arthritis and joint pain throughout the entire body:
- Knee: pain with stairs, kneeling, squatting, and prolonged walking
- Hip: deep groin or outer hip pain that worsens with walking or standing
- Shoulder: aching with reaching, lifting, or lying on that side at night
- Facet joints of the spine: a very common cause of chronic neck and back pain
- Hands and fingers: morning stiffness, swelling, and reduced grip strength
- Ankles and feet: especially in patients who are on their feet all day
Treatment Options
There is no one-size-fits-all solution for arthritis. Dr. Koppel builds a treatment plan based on which joint is affected, the severity of the damage, what the patient has already tried, and their goals.
PRP Therapy (Platelet-Rich Plasma)
PRP uses concentrated growth factors from your own blood, injected directly into the damaged joint. Rather than simply masking pain, PRP stimulates tissue repair and can slow the progression of arthritis. Many patients notice improvement within a few weeks, with continued gains over three to six months.
Regenerative Cell Therapy
For patients with more significant joint degeneration, regenerative cell therapy delivers powerful healing regenerative cells into the joint to support cartilage repair and reduce long-term inflammation. Free consultations are available.
Genicular Nerve Block and Radiofrequency Ablation
For knee arthritis specifically, this approach blocks the small nerves that carry pain signals from the knee to the brain. A diagnostic nerve block first confirms these nerves are the source, then radiofrequency ablation can interrupt those signals for a year or more.
Joint Injections
Targeted anti-inflammatory injections placed directly into the affected joint provide fast, meaningful relief. They reduce inflammation and restore enough function that many patients can return to normal activities and participate in physical therapy.
Spinal Cord Stimulation
For chronic joint pain that has not responded to other treatments, a small implanted device delivers gentle electrical signals that interrupt pain pathways. This is a longer-term option for persistent, difficult-to-treat joint pain.
Do You Really Need Joint Replacement Surgery?
The two questions arthritis patients ask most often:
- Can I just take medication?
- And do I need joint replacement surgery?
Medication reduces discomfort but does nothing to address the underlying joint degeneration. Joint replacement is a major surgery with a months-long recovery, real risks, and results that vary widely. After nearly 30 years of treating arthritis, Dr. Koppel’s position is straightforward: exhaust every appropriate non-surgical option first. In the vast majority of cases, that’s enough.
If surgery ultimately becomes the right answer, Dr. Koppel will tell you honestly and help coordinate that care. But it should never be the starting point.
Frequently Asked Questions
Treatment is Within Reach
Neck pain that shoots into your shoulder, arm, or hand isn’t something you have to live with. Dr. Todd Koppel at Garden State Pain Management has decades of experience diagnosing and treating cervical radiculopathy with minimally invasive interventional therapies, so you get targeted relief without major surgery.
Serving patients throughout New Jersey from two convenient locations in Clifton and Elizabeth, help is within reach. Call our office at (973) 473-5752 or book your appointment online.
