DolorClast® Radial Shock Waves New 2025

First-line high-energy therapy for musculoskeletal chronic pathologies and sports injuries

DolorClast^® Radial Shock Waves Therapy offers a non-invasive and fast solution with clinically proven results to chronic superficial musculoskeletal pathologies.
As part of Guided DolorClast^® Therapy (GDT), it targets the root cause of pain and neurogenic inflammation to promote natural healing, avoiding having recourse to surgery or injections.

What Is Radial Shock Wave Therapy?

Radial Shock Wave Therapy (RSWT^®) is a non-invasive modality that applies high-energy acoustic waves to targeted tissues which result in:

An analgesic effect – with the inhibition of Substance P which is responsible for increasing pain signals.
An anti-inflammatory action – by reducing the neurogenic inflammation and allowing scleraxis expression.
An activation of specific healing mechanisms – by improving angiogenesis and blood circulation, helping the repair of damaged fibers or stimulating tendons, cartilage and bone healing. Stimulate regeneration of muscle, tendon, cartilage, and bone through angiogenesis and cellular repair

handpiece

How does it work?

In 1997, EMS designed the first pneumatic-ballistic system to generate extracorporeal radial shock waves. Grounded in Newton’s principle that motion transfers energy, EMS designed the DolorClast^® handpiece to harness that physics:

Compressed air propels a projectile inside the handpiece that strikes a fixed applicator at speeds up to ~90 km/h.
The projectile’s kinetic energy is converted into a shock wave that safely penetrates the tissues and delivers its energy up to 4 cm

This ensures clinically relevant energy per shock, a key factor for treatment success.
Shock waves energy causes tissues to respond.

Each shock wave has two phases:

Compression (P+): Builds pressure and shear stress.
Decompression (P–): Generates cavitation bubbles—microbubbles that form and collapse, creating additional mechanical forces and biological signaling.

Why Energy Matters: the key to clinical effectiveness

Higher energy output leads to increased cavitation within the tissues. Simply put, the more energy delivered, the greater the pressure—and the higher the level of cavitation.

Cavitation activates biological responses that wouldn’t happen otherwise. The effectiveness of shock wave therapy is closely linked to the amount of cavitation produced by the device.

High energy per shock is essential as demonstrated in recent clinical studies. Importantly, increasing the number of shocks does not compensate for low energy levels in terms of therapy efficiency.

In short, delivering sufficient high-energy shock waves generates strong cavitation levels, which are key to ensuring effective therapeutic results. DolorClast^® is engineered to generate optimal cavitation levels, even at higher frequencies, something many low-energy devices can’t achieve.

Key Applications

DolorClast^® Radial Shock Waves address a wide range of conditions, including:

Tendinopathy (Achilles, patellar, rotator cuff)
Plantar fasciitis
Myofascial pain syndromes
Spasticity
Large muscular areas and fasciopathies
Post-surgical rehabilitation and sports injuries

Treatment Framework - Guided DolorClast® Therapy (GDT)

DolorClast^® solutions deliver high amounts of clinically relevant energy, so GDT focuses on maximizing energy delivery, always as much as the patient can tolerate safely.
Rather than following a one-size-fits-all formula, practitioners:

Assess the patient’s condition (pathology, tissue tolerance).
Deliver as much energy as possible during each session, using the device’s protocols (Ramp-Up, Analgesic, Burst) to build tolerance where needed.
Use appropriate applicators and frequencies (up to 25 Hz) to ensure both treatment comfort and efficiency.

This approach ensures that patients receive the full biological benefit of high-energy shock waves, including cavitation-driven healing responses.