Inflammation, inflammation, inflammation!! Nowadays we hear all this talk about inflammation, everywhere we look we hear people saying how inflammation is the devil reincarnated, they try to “fix” this inflammation problem with all sorts of diets and drugs, but is inflammation that bad for you?
What is inflammation?
So you went out with your friends to play some basketball, that’s good, exercise is good for you, you know what isn’t good for you? That friend of yours that’s really bad at basketball, he was way too aggressive during the match and made you fall.
You limped all the way back home and checked on your knee only to realize it was swollen, hot, red it really hurt and you weren’t able to move it.
What the hell happened to your knee? It was Inflammation!!
Let me explain, inflammation is the way your body reacts to an infection or lesion. When you have a lesion or an infection many chemicals are secreted in the area, histamine, leukotrienes, prostaglandins, chemokines, etc. These chemicals are going to tell your immunity system and blood system that you have a lesion thus calling nutrients, blood cells, and immune cells (macrophages and neutrophils) to the affected area, to combat the infection and repair the affected place.
The clinical manifestations of inflammation are:
- Pain
- Increase in temperature
- Swelling
- Loss of function
- Redness
What are anti-inflammatory drugs?
Anti-inflammatory drugs are a type of drug that works to reduce inflammation, they can be divided into 2 subtypes depending if they are based on hormones or not:
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) - these work by inhibiting the COX enzyme. The cox enzyme is involved in the production of prostaglandins, one of the chemical signals the cells utilize to call blood cells and immune cells from the blood vessels to the injured area. They don’t, however, work on leukotrienes, keeping a part of inflammation still present. As examples of this subtype, we have ibuprofen and aspirin.
Steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs AKA corticosteroids – these work by inhibiting the phospholipase A2 enzyme, inhibiting the production of prostaglandins and leukotrienes, which make them more effective than NSAIDs.
Ok, so I just told you that inflammation is the mechanism that your body utilizes to increase the healing speed, and anti-inflammatory drugs stop and or reduce inflammation, so why should we take anti-inflammatory drugs? Won’t that decrease the speed of healing?
When to take?
When you need to go back to work as fast as you can:
As I mentioned above, inflammation causes pain, swelling and loss of function, these three symptoms can sometimes get in the way of our daily jobs, and we need those jobs to pay our bills... so if inflammation is getting in the way of your job then yes you should take anti-inflammatory drugs to go back to work as fast as you can, but just know that by taking those anti-inflammatory drugs your healing speed will be decreased, and there are some studies being done that are trying to correlate chronic tendinopathy with the use of anti-inflammatory drugs.
Storytime:
I’m about to tell you something that happened to me some years ago.
When I was 19 years old I torn my meniscus, my knee swelled up and I couldn’t move my leg, my doctor told me to rest, elevate and take some anti-inflammatory, my brother however, which is also a doctor, told me that I shouldn’t take those, that since I was on vacation and I had time to heal I should let inflammation run its course… this was during my first year in veterinary medicine, I searched online, and used my own knowledge and I did what my brother told me, it took 2 months for the inflammation to go away, my knee repaired itself and is now at 99%, yes I had to wait/lose 2 months of my vacations, but at least I won’t have to live with a half repaired meniscus for the rest of my life, like I see in many people.
When you have a condition that causes chronic inflammation
There are many types of conditions that cause chronic inflammation, everything that is in excess is bad for you, even inflammation, to name a few of those conditions we got asthma, autoimmune disorders, Crohn’s disease, etc..
What about anti-inflammatory diets?
Nowadays we live in constant stress, that stress makes us release a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol works in many ways around your body, one of those ways is by causing inflammation, this is where anti-inflammatory diets come in, they can be used to lower the effects of the inflammation caused by cortisol.
Anti-inflammatory diets have also been helpful to reduce chronic inflammation.
What types of food can I consume in an anti-inflammatory diet?
Foods:
The base of anti-inflammatory diets is to consume more good fats, fruits, and vegetables like vegans and vegetarians do, and less meat, fried foods, refined carbohydrates (carbs) and sugary drinks.
SourceSpices:
You can also use some spices to reduce inflammation, like ginger and turmeric, you can also add black pepper which increases the absorption of turmeric by A LOT, according to the studies.
Source
I should also mention that some studies have found a correlation between inflammation and the aging process but since there aren't that many studies about the issue I'm going to wait, "better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt"
I'm happy to discuss this topic in the comment section, I'm always glad to know more and to learn from my fellow steemians
DISCLAIMER: Always remember that I'm just a random guy on the internet, you should always do your own research and talk with your doctor about medical expertise
Resources :
https://www.webmd.com/diet/anti-inflammatory-diet-road-to-good-health#1
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2770552/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10623981
http://stoneathleticmedicine.com/2013/11/why-ice-and-anti-inflammatory-medication-is-not-the-answer/
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120402162546.htm
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/248423.php
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3918523/ - one of the many studies that correlate the increase in turmeric absorption (curcumin to be more specific) with the intake of black pepper
If you enjoyed this post, check out some of my other posts:
https://steemit.com/education/@teutonium/how-antibiotics-are-killing-people-indirectly
In America, I think that the reason we take half of the world's amount of medication is because we are looking for an immediate fix and often it seems convenient when all the answers lie within one capsule. I agree that the best approach is the allow time for your own body to repair itself with natural remedies, rest, ice before diving into the arsenal of drug options. Of course, some are needed to function for chronic illnesses such as auto immune where getting out of bed requires steroids.
Yup, it's exactly that! Thanks for reading, i like this type of stuff, my next topic will be about fever, i'm trying to give the post some "comedy" to make it a less boring read
Makes me look in a whole different way at inflammation.
It makes sense that it's a good thing though (in moderation) because the same counts for a fever.
When you think about it, the healthy kind of inflammation is kinda like a localised fever, hahaha.
Yeah, most people use and abuse anti-inflammatories, they are just messing up their own body...
Fever will be my next topic
If you liked this you can go and check out my other post about antibiotics :)
We have already established that my body hates me. That being said Veganism was the best things that happened to me. I became Vegetarian at the age of 12 and had a pretty dairy centric diet. Dairy is hell for inflammation but I was cheese addicted and I did not care. I have IBS everytime I ate a lot of cheese I would pay for it . I have asthma I was on a long working daly steroid and albuterol.Then later on in my 30's I started developing arthritis in my shoulder where I had an old martial arts injury , then one hip started getting affected. For 10 years I would get painful flares that would leave me half immobile. But still I did not want to give up that cheese ... Then i saw some dairy farm footage and I realised that I did not want to be part of the horrors in that industry so on my 40th birthday I went vegan. 2 months in and my IBS flares became less frequent, about 2 months more and I was off the steroids and started to use my inhaler maybe once a month instead of once a day. 6 months in and my arthritis was gone! now 9 almost ten years in it has been 6 months since i have used my inhaler and I used it about 1-2 times in the year before that, I had one arteritis flare in the whole 9 years (after eating a really high fat meal ). My IBS does show up from time to time but no way in the amount that it used to. My other condition is sadly genetic so there is little diet can do to change it but seriously veganim has me off most of my medication.
Yeah veganism is pretty good, my only problem with veganism, as i said in steemit chat, is the amount of protein, vitamin b12 and iron, i workout a lot and being vegan is almost impossible for me because i run into those problems, i tried for 1 year, i ate 500g of spinach a day just trying to get iron in me, only to realize the iron from plant sources is not that well absorbed i was getting anemic and had to take a iron supplement
I love trying to fix whatever problem have with food, sometimes i need to take medicine of course, but i always try to fix the problem with food, i've stopped drinking milk, i do however eat fat-free light greek yogurt and whey protein, i think it has almost 0 lactose.
Only had IBS 1 time, or at least i think it was IBS, and it was my own damn fault, wanted to try a thermogenic, only took it for 2 days, that damn thing had capsacin in it (the stuff that makes hot sauce hot), never trying that stuff again
Thanks for reading, and stay away from that cheese and eat your vegetables xD
nods I am vegan for ethical reasons as the industry is killing our planet, animals and people and I just can be part of that. You can get more than enough protein and Iron on a plant based diet if you know what to eat. B12 is trickier, however 40% of the world population is vitamin B12 deficient and only 1% of the world population is plant based so many have to take supplements anyway. Some people have genetic issues and cannot absorb certain vitamins or minerals well so they need to supplement no matter what diet. I for example have issues with vitamin D and B12 absorption so I take multivitamins and get a regular B12 shot. there are several vegan body builders and strongmen. Wold Champion Patrik Baboumian for example but they eat totally different then most plant based folk. Brian Turner has some good videos on that as well.
P.S Turmeric is amazing I use it for some of my older dogs to help them with there old age here is a recipe for Turmeric paste that is good for dogs and cats !
Thanks for the recipe, might use it in my line of work, turmeric truly is amazing, if you use it for yourself you can add blackpepper like i said, it increases turmeric absorpiont by a bunch, sometimes to 1000x times
nods thats why it is in the paste :D
Ohh yeah, only saw the coconut oil and turmeric xD, the dogs still eat it even with black pepper? maybe the coconut oil stop the black pepper from being spicy...i've got to try this
I home cook for them so I just mix it under the rest and they are fine with it ...
Good post man, again I totally agree with you on this one, NSAIDs are waaaay over-used.
People don't think about why the wound or whatever is inflamed in the first place and are way too quick to just take some NSAIDs and be done with it.
As highlighted in your post, our bodies have methods in their madness and there's usually a reason for what's happening. It wouldn't make evolutionary sense if our bodies stimulated the inflammatory process and it was of no benefit to us.
Taking NSAID's just hides the issue and makes it worse in the long run. But yeah, chronic inflammation there's not much you can do other than take drugs unfortunately.