Managing Inflammation in Your Body

Inflammation is your body's natural response to bacteria, viruses and foreign matter. It is a normal reaction and is actually part of the healing process.....in a normal situation. The problems begin when this normal response to everyday stimulus, doesn't do its duty and then go away.


In any situation where your body finds something that does not belong, a reaction begins immediately to fight off the invader. Depending on the type of invader it is, you could have several different reactions. Many common reactions to these invaders are itchy-watery eyes, runny nose, fever, rash, body aches and the like. These irritations are actually not symptoms of the invader itself, they are caused by your body's natural response to the foreign objects. Due to years and years of ads showing that you can reduce fever with pills, many people think that a fever is a bad thing and they take an over the counter medicine as soon as it hits. This actually goes against what your body does automatically to fight off viruses and bacteria.


In a situation of constant inflammation, such-as many autoimmune disorders, the body is continuously fighting, and sometimes its even fighting itself. Chronic inflammation numbs the body's ability to determine the good guys from the bad guys. Which means it could also attack its own tissues, or become so inflamed that it can not do its job properly.

Chronic inflammation of the arteries is what allows plaque to attach itself to the walls of the arteries and cause blockages and hardening of the arteries. This particular type of inflammation can be checked by testing the levels of C-reactive protein in the blood, which we do at our clinic.


If your intestines are inflamed, much of what we eat could pass on by and the nutrients would not be absorbed. This could also allow things that we would not normally use as nutrition (such as pesticides, and microorganisms) to be absorbed by the body. Intestinal inflammations are most often caused by what we eat. Food sensitivity testing is the best way to find out what is causing this type of inflammation.

Many people are unaware that being overweight actually causes inflammation in your body, and that diabetes is an inflammatory condition. Testing shows that reducing your weight, and your risk of diabetes reduces the amount of inflammation in your body automatically. Exercise is also a great way to help your body fight inflammation. It gets all of your "juices" flowing and gets blood and oxygen into places where it may not be reaching easily.

Chronic inflammation can be caused by many different factors. Many times inflammation is increased by the types of foods we consume, but it can also be reduced by what we eat. We do recommend that you avoid certain types of foods if you have inflammation of any kind. Soda, pork, chocolate, cows milk, and sugar are some of the foods that increase inflammation. To reduce inflammation you should increase your intake of certain nutrients. We typically recommend supplements such as buffered vitamin C, Essential Fatty Acids, Bromelain, Quercetin, and sometimes others, depending on the type of inflammation.

For more information and to reduce the inflammation in your body please feel free to stop by our office. We have dietary recommendations and supplements available at your convenience.