I speak daily to people affected by inflammation. This commonly affects joints but can affect most types of body tissue. While we can feel the discomfort of joint inflammation we cannot feel inflammation of blood vessels till disease symptoms appear.
Our immune system responds to injury and sickness by generating inflammation. This is an essential part of our in-built repair and recovery systems. While we cannot heal without inflammation, unwanted inflammation can not only slow healing but create new problems. The long list of problems with the suffix ‘itis’ are all inflammatory diseases.
One of the reasons we are told to eat lots of deep coloured plants is that the anti-inflammatory antioxidants are locked into their bright colours. It is the yellow in turmeric that contains Curcumin. It is the purple colour on grape seeds that contain the potent OPC’s.
While osteoarthritis is the most common joint problem, others such as tendonitis, bursitis and rheumatoid arthritis affect many people. The centre of any nutritional medicine programme is an anti-inflammatory diet.
The core parts of an anti-inflammatory diet are anti-inflammatory fats and anti-inflammatory antioxidants. While your body needs both Omega 3 and Omega 6 fats, our western diets have a massive imbalance with much more Omega 6 than we need or should have. World health authorities recommend a ratio of Omega 6 to Omega 3 of under 5:1. Personally I prefer under 3:1. Mine is 2.6:1. Higher ratios push the body to an inflammatory environment.
Adding well formulated supplements with high grade ingredients can add healing compounds at levels much higher than through diet alone. Two of the most potent are Curcumin from turmeric and the OPC’s (oligomeric proanthocyanidins) from grape seeds.
For example adding 1000mg of 95% Curcumin has the curcumin in several tablespoons of turmeric. You would need to eat tablespoons of red wine grape seeds to get 100mg of pure OPC.
I speak to clients on daily basis that are more mobile and more comfortable by adding potent natural anti-inflammatory compounds. One with rheumatoid arthritis is much more comfortable by reducing inflammatory foods and adding 1000mg of Curcumin and 200mg of OPC daily.