Arthritis & Joint Pain
                                                              By: Dr. Alan Goldhamer
                                                         Founder; TrueNorth Health Center.  

                                              
           Learn how to live without this
                                               
          debilitating disease.  

                                              
           While most arthritis sufferers are
                                              
           being told that they will need to
                                               
          "learn to live with it" at the TrueNorth
Health Center in Santa Rosa, Calif., we are helping patients learn
to live without it.  

Arthritis is a general term, which means inflammation of one of the joints in the
body.  We have all experienced inflammation at one time or another.  The most
common cause of inflammation is injury.  

Suppose you lose your footing and fall.  During the fall you injure your ankle
by twisting it.  As a result, your ankle becomes inflamed. The injured area
becomes red and hot, it swells up, and you experience pain.  

Fortunately, the symptoms associated with acute inflammation are part of the
healing process.  The increased blood flow to the area brings with it extra
white blood cells, results in swelling and pain, and limits mobility, which
prevents further damage.  This process allows your body to heal itself quickly.  

Because there are many different causes of inflammation, there are many
different kinds of arthritis.  The initial inflammation resulting from trauma or
other injury, such as the one described above is not the big problem.  

Continuous inflammation- the kind that goes on for years- is what leads to the
very debilitating problems of arthritis, and it can result in permanently
dysfunctional and deformed joints.  

                     
                 Osteoarthritis
The most common form of arthritis is called Osteoarthritis.  This is what most
people mean when they say,
"My arthritis is bothering me."  The other name
for
Osteoarthritis is degenerative joint disease, which is a pretty good
description of what happens when the joints degenerate.  

Osteoarthritis is seen most frequently in the joints that are most used and
abused.  It is considered a disease of
"aging" but certainly it is not caused by
getting older.  

Whether you develop
Osteoarthritis or not depends, to a large degree, on how
you live your life.  In fact,
Osteoarthritis is not just for the aged.  By age 30, 35%
of people are beginning to show some signs of
osteoarthritic changes in their
knees, and by ages 70 to 79 at least 85% of people have diagnosable
Osteoarthritis.  

Osteoarthritis can take place in any joint.  As you would expect, carpenters
tend to develop
Osteoarthritis in their wrists, elbows, and shoulders.  Tailors
tend to develop it in their hands and fingers.  People who are obese tend to
have inflammation in their ankles, knees, and hips.  

Typically,
Osteoarthritis affects a single joint or just a few joints.  The early
stages of the process are painless.  But in time, the pain begins to develop into
a deep ache.  

Many people with
Osteoarthritis feel some stiffness after resting and upon
waking in the morning.  But this stiffness usually lessens after the person has
had time to move around a little.  

                 
              Rheumatoid Arthritis
Rheumatoid arthritis belongs to a group of ailments that are called
antigen/antibody diseases, or immune complex diseases.  In
rheumatoid
arthritis
, the immune system malfunctions and damages the joint tissues.  
Inflammation of the joints leads to cartilage destruction.  
Rheumatoid arthritis
is found in between 1% and 4% of the population.  

All of your joints are covered by a layer of smooth cartilage, which allows your
joints to move easily; this lets your body move and distribute its weight evenly.

The
rheumatoid arthritis process causes the degeneration and destruction of
this cartilage.  Once this happens, the bone itself begins to erode and the joint
becomes deformed.  

Rheumatoid arthritis is usually seen in the peripheral joints-especially the
hands, elbows, knees, and even the feet sometimes-and because it is a
systemic problem, the distribution is usually symmetrical.

If you have it on your right side, you usually have it on the left side, too, in the
same joints.  You have probably seen someone who has swollen and
misshapen joints that do not bend properly.  These severe changes are often
the result of
rheumatoid arthritis.  

Rheumatoid arthritis affects approximately three times more women than men,
and most often appears between the ages of 35 and 50.  Rest, which is helpful
in
Osteoarthritis, does not seem to alleviate the pain of rheumatoid arthritis;
the pain persists.  

In addition, morning stiffness is much more severe than in
Osteoarthritis; it
lasts a longer time.  As a result, many people resort to taking some kind of
medication to get past the stiffness and pain just so they can button their
clothes or tie their shoes.  

Osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis are the most common types of arthritis.  
But there are other less common types, such as
gout, lupus erythematosus,
psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis
, etc.  

There appears to be a genetic predisposition to
rheumatoid arthritis, and the
less common types of
arthritis tend to have strong genetic predispositions
associated with them as well.  

                            
 Is There Hope For Relief?
People who suffer from arthritis usually seek some form of treatment to solve
their problem.  Unfortunately,
arthritis of all types has a very poor prognosis
under medical treatment.  There is no cure for any of the types of
arthritis, and
medical treatment consists mainly of attempting to relieve pain.  

Although medical treatment is not a viable solution, there is hope for those
willing to develop a new awareness.  New attitudes and behaviors toward
arthritis can lead to the lessening, and sometimes the elimination, of pain.  

                       
                   Practical Tips
Some of the steps you can take to alleviate the pain of Osteoarthritis are
primarily mechanical and are relatively easy to implement.  

Osteoarthritis can be caused or aggravated by poor body mechanics, so
correction of poor posture and training in proper body use-such as the
Alexander technique or similar techniques that teach proper body use-may be
beneficial in relieving pain and stopping the progression of
Osteoarthritis.  

Do not overload or overtax your joints.  Alternate your activities to use
different parts of your body, and if possible take frequent rest periods during
the day.  

You can apply heat packs or ice packs both before and after a session of use
of an inflamed joint.  This can be very helpful in reducing pain and stiffness.  
Ice and heat stimulate blood flow to the area, which brings in added oxygen
and nutrients.  

                                  
 Beneficial Exercise
Mild exercise that moves the joint but does not aggravate it, can be very
beneficial.  Exercise prevents muscle atrophy around the affected joints.  
Muscles protect the joints, which is why it is so important to maintain the
muscle strength around an
arthritic joint.  

Exercise also helps circulate fluids in the joint capsule. There aren't any direct
blood vessels that go right to the joint surfaces, so oxygen and nutrients
cannot get directly to the cartilage coating around the joints.  

Nutrients have to diffuse from the nearest blood vessels into the fluid that is in
each joint.  Exercise assures that there is plenty of motion of the fluid around
the joints, so that the nutrients and the oxygen can get delivered. This allows
the joints to repair themselves and prevents further degeneration.  

Exercise only to the point where pain is not made worse.  Some people may
need to change the type of exercise they do.  Runners who start developing
arthritic knees and hips may need to switch to swimming, which takes the
weight off the joint but still allows full joint motion.  

Consultation with a chiropractor or exercise physiologist may be necessary to
determine what type of exercise you can do to maintain muscle integrity and
joint motion, while not making the degeneration worse.  

Foot problems can cause the mechanics of the entire lower body to become
faulty, which can put pressure in the wrong places and cause degeneration of
the lower extremity joints.  

Wearing the proper shoes and possibly using orthotics (devices that hold
your foot in a particular position) may help normalize the mechanics of the
foot, resulting in reduced knee and hip pain.  

                
                     Full Range Of Motion
Chiropractic care and physical therapy can be of benefit.  Chiropractic
adjustments can help
arthritic joints by restoring a complete range of motion.  
The breakdown and degeneration of a joint sometimes leads to the joint
becoming tight and restricted in its movements.  

When it does not move through its full range, a number of problems can occur.
 The joint will not get the circulation it needs, and the joints above and below it
have to move more to compensate.  This puts extra stress on these other
joints and eventually can cause problems.  By restoring the full range of
motion and the joint
"play" chiropractic care may alleviate pain and restore
normal joint function.  

Every day, virtually everyone inflames their joints through normal daily
activities.  Fortunately, if you get sufficient rest and sleep, your body can heal
during the night.  If you do not get sufficient sleep, the inflammation can
increase faster than your body can heal; this may lead to chronic problems.  

                                     
Dietary Factors
People in other cultures work just as hard as Americans do, and a certain
percentage of those populations probably have genetic predispositions
similar to those of Americans.  But people in those cultures tend not to
develop
arthritis at anywhere near the same rate as in the United States.  Why?
 It appears that diet is a major factor.  

In cultures where people eat very small quantities of animal fat and animal
protein, there is a much lower incidence of all kinds of
arthritis.  When these
people relocate to a city or country where people eat the same type of diet that
we do in the United States, their incidence of
arthritis increases dramatically.  

That is a clear indication that the westernized diet is involved in the
development of arthritis.  The two biggest dietary culprits seem to be animal fat
and animal protein.  

At the
TrueNorth Health Center, we see many people experience a decrease in
their
Osteoarthritis after changing their diets.  

The dietary changes do not reverse the joint deformities, which remain
unchanged.  But the pain still diminishes, because the improved diet helps
reduce the inflammation in the joints.  

                              
  Eating Animal Products
Rheumatoid arthritis is rare in societies where animal products are seldom
eaten, such as in Africa, Japan, and China.  And when
rheumatoid arthritis
does develop, it is usually much milder and is associated with much less
disability than in the United States.  

There are several theories as to why diet influences these antibody/antigen
complex diseases, and the culprits are again protein and fat.  

Any foreign protein that comes into the body is called an antigen.  Our immune
system manufactures antibodies to fight these invading substances, and
antibody/antigen complexes are formed.  

The invaders can be viruses, bacteria, or food protein.  (Most people do not
think about food protein when they think of invading protein or other foreign
proteins.)  

The antibodies fight antigens by attaching to them and clumping them
together to form complexes (many antibodies and antigens clumped together).
 These complexes are usually eliminated from the body by the immune
system.  

But in some people this does not happen.  Instead, the complexes become
lodged in various tissues around the body where they cause inflammation
(much like a splinter causes when it lodges).  When these complexes lodge in
the joints, you get pain, swelling, and redness.  

Diet can play an additional role in antigen/antibody problems if a person's
intestines allow large food proteins to enter the body.  When we eat, our
digestive system breaks the food down into smaller and smaller particles.  In
most people the particles have to be very, very small down to their basic
components-before they can get from the digestive tract into the body proper.  

But in some people, proteins are able to get through at an earlier stage, when
they are still quite large and complex.  This process is called
"gut leakage."  

When these larger proteins get into the body, they are perceived as antigens.  
The body starts attacking them and trying to eliminate them.  

Eating a high-protein diet, especially one containing animal products, may
make people who have a genetic tendency to allow larger particles into their
bodies more susceptible to
arthritis.  

           
                  Diet Change Alleviates Pain
One study that supports the contention that diet plays a role in the evolution of
arthritis was undertaken at Wayne State University Medical School.  The
results were dramatic.  

Investigators took six rheumatoid
arthritis patients and fed them a totally
fat-free diet for seven weeks.  During that time all six patients experienced a
complete remission from the pain.  The symptoms recurred within 72 hours
when either vegetable oil or animal fat was introduced to their diets.  

If they ate chicken, beef, cheese, coconut oil, or safflower oil, they experienced
severe
arthritic pain within 72 hours.  

                                         
Fasting In Recovery
People's reactions to the various antigens can be very different.  Dairy
products, eggs, beef, wheat, and corn are the most common culprits, but there
are many others, some of them quite obscure.  

If a person suffering from
rheumatoid arthritis wants to find out what foods he
or she is sensitive to, the best way to go about it is to undertake a period of
fasting (ingesting only pure water), followed by a period of rotational feeding.  

Many
arthritis patients have fasted at the TrueNorth Health Center.  During the
fasting period, it is common for joint pain and swelling to totally disappear.  

This pain-free period provides welcome relief, but proper re-feeding after the
fast is crucial.  In fact, there is no point in undertaking a fast if your intention is
to go back to your previous way of eating because this behavior is part of the
problem (possibly the major part).  

                  
                      Life After The Fasting
During the re-feeding period we can find out which foods are contributing to
the joint pain.  We introduce various foods slowly, one at a time, starting with
those that are least likely to cause problems.  

Ideally, every patient would eat the diet we recommend at the Center-a
plant-based diet of fresh fruits, vegetables, and the variable addition of nuts,
grains, and legumes.  This diet is low in fat, low in protein, high in fiber, and
contains no animal products.  

But some people's systems are intolerant even to some of these plant-based
foods.  

Arthritis patients need to learn which foods they can eat without inducing
symptoms, and how much they can eat of those acceptable foods.   

Some people find that they cannot tolerate very much fruit; others find that
they can tolerate some vegetables but not others.  Simply eliminating the
worst offenders-meats, dairy products, eggs, and wheat-may not be adequate
to relieve the pain in a particular individual.  

Re-feeding is a learning process.  Each person is different, and each person
must learn how he or she needs to eat (and live) in order to remain free from
arthritis pain.  

As a result of their new awareness, many people come to consider their
arthritis a kind of "blessing" because a reoccurrence of their arthritic pain
reminds them of their need to adhere closely to a health-promoting lifestyle.  

                                 Experience Of Success
At the TrueNorth Health Center, we have found that the most effective
approach to
arthritis involves an appropriate period of supervised fasting,
followed by a health-promoting diet, appropriate exercise, adequate rest and
sleep, good body mechanics and posture, and, when appropriate, chiropractic
manipulation and physical therapy.  
Arthritis is something our patients are
learning to live without.  

By: Dr. Alan Goldhamer,  www.healthpromoting.com
Founder;
TrueNorth Health Center.  

Article: Arthritis & Joint Pain
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