We have all heard of inflammation and most of us think that inflammation is a bad thing, but actually if we didn’t have inflammation we wouldn’t be able to fight infection or heal tissues that have been damaged.
Inflammation is one way our body keeps us safe and it increases if something potentially dangerous happens inside our body, perhaps a germ or a cut or you’ve put too much pressure on a tissue, but amazingly it also increases if we get stressed. Yes! if you are thinking about something that makes you fearful or angry or anxious inflammation in your body will increase, so this is very important when we are talking about Osteoarthritis (O.A) because inflammation is one of the three main drivers of pain in O.A.
If you read the previous blog on O.A you will have read that inflammation plays a key role in O.A of the knee and if we can reduce inflammation it will help you move better, make your knee and body structures healthier and enhance your bodies ability to change and adapt.
When we think of inflammation most of us think of pain, swelling, redness and warmth often in a joint or in a contained area and this can be good because it is a sign that our body is fighting the infection and laying down new cells to heal the area. However not all inflammation is local. Some inflammation called SYSTEMIC inflammation is produced throughout our whole body. This type can be driven by local inflammation, infection, your gut, your thoughts and your genes. Now O.A is a process of systemic inflammation in our body, this is good news because that means there are many ways to change it.
So can you see that physical activity, de-stressing stratigies, diet changes and having fun and enjoying your self can all help to redress the balance.
Now we have all heard that being overweight can make your O.A. worse but you may have believed that’s because of the weight on the joint but with science we now know that it’s not the weight because why would finger joints get O.A.? It turns out that inflammation can be a reaction to excess fat in our body or eating too much pro-inflammatory foods like processed or sugary foods and may cause systemic inflammation. So simple dietary changes including plenty vegetables, fruit, nuts, pulses and oily fish and adding a little more activity into your day will have a beneficial effect on your O.A. knee.
Hear are some tips to help reduce your inflammation
- Slowly increase your activity- this could be walking, ideally 20 minutes a day in 10 minute chunks. To avoid unpleasant reactions, build up to this slowly
- Eat more Anti-Inflammatory foods
- Learn as much as possible about the science- be informed.
- Even if you think its too late for you- you can always make small changes that can have amazing results.
- Laughter is medicine and have good social support around you.
- Sleep is when our bodies do a lot of healing so try and improve your sleep hygiene
- Get out in nature, reap the benefits of communing with the greenery, birds and the bees.
- No surprise that cigarettes and booze are the most pro-inflammatory things we can ingest- see if you can make some changes here.
REMEMBER SMALL POSITIVE CHANGES CAN REDUCE THE PAIN IN YOUR KNEE WITH OSTEOARTHRITIS.
