Dr. Matthew Fellner LAc.
Inflammation is a buzz word that is gaining traction throughout the medical and wellness industry. Inflammation has been implicated as the cause for almost every kind of illness and disease today from allergies to arthritis to heart disease, Alzheimer’s, and even cancer. Reducing inflammation will not only make you feel more vibrant and healthier but will significantly reduce your likelihood of suffering from a chronic disease.
Inflammation by itself is not a bad thing. It is the body’s natural response to any type of injury or invader it considers potentially harmful. This includes germs, environmental pollutants, toxins, and trauma. When you sprain your ankle and it swells to the size of a grapefruit, your body is protecting the surrounding tissue and allowing the process of healing to take place. When you have a fever, the body is raising the inflammation to help combat whatever bacteria or virus is causing the illness. The dangerous aspect of inflammation occurs when it becomes chronic, or the body responds with inflammation when there is no need. This leads to a litany of health conditions that are often difficult to clearly identify and therefore, often difficult to treat. The Cleveland Clinic website lists the following symptoms as caused by inflammation, but often not immediately attributed to that inflammation:
- Abdominal Pain
- Chest pain
- Fatigue & Insomnia
- Joint pain or stiffness.
- Skin Rashes
- Depression, anxiety, and other mood disorders
- Gastrointestinal (GI) issues, like diarrhea, constipation, and acid reflux
- Weight gain or weight loss
- Frequent infections.
So what causes our body to have a chronic, or overactive inflammatory response?
As you might imagine, many of the culprits are the same that are implicated in a wide variety of health issues. They include:
- Obesity
- Smoking
- Excess alcohol
- Poor sleep habits
- Stress
- Inadequate physical activity
- Exposure to environmental pollutants, toxins, and chemicals
- Imbalance of intestinal flora (known as dysbiosis)
- Consumption of inflammatory foods
In Chinese Medicine & Acupuncture, we use the above list to establish a pattern of health within each individual patient. Although the term inflammation sounds like fire, not every instance of inflammation is necessarily related to overheating, and not every case is exactly alike.
In TCM we often base our diagnoses on the consistent patterns that people express in the lives. This includes both healthy habits, and repetitive pathological tendencies. It gives us insight into how and why the body expresses itself; both when things are going well, and in the case of chronic inflammation, when things are not. Our diagnoses are influenced by the factors that often aggravate a condition or alleviate a condition, and in what additional systems or parts of the body the symptoms arise. Here are a few simple examples:
Often people experience chronic inflammatory pain in the joints that we diagnose as “cold obstruction”. This may sound counterintuitive to the term inflammation, but we use that term because the pain may be significantly worse in the winter and may be significantly improved by warmth applied directly to the joint. Additional symptoms to support the diagnosis of “cold”, would be frequently feeling cold, and craving warm drinks and food, even in summer.
The flip side to this would be “heat obstruction”. Here the person ices the inflamed areas for relief and is worse in Summer. They may also sweat easily, have a red face, high blood pressure, headaches, or other symptoms that cause the “heat” to rise in the body.
Some of you may be familiar with the sensation of knowing when it may rain prior to its arrival. This is a classic indication of “damp obstruction”. Here we have an imbalance in fluid circulation causing more fluid to build in the joints. The pressure builds in the joints and then is more sensitive to pressure changes in the atmosphere common before storms. “Dampness” also manifests with more swelling, but it can also show up in some of the bowel and GI inflammatory issues such as nausea and diarrhea.
These are just a few examples of how we can treat based on individual characteristics. It takes time to establish the correct treatment strategy that best suits the individual patient. And then it takes time for the body to adapt to the new patterns than are being established to offset the effects of the inflammation. But in the long run, acupuncture is one of the safest and most effective treatments available for dealing with inflammation. Acupuncture has been proven to promote circulation and release many anti-inflammatory chemicals including dopamine, adenosine, and endomorphin. Acupuncture is a safe, effective, and drug free treatment option that will help you:
Feel less pain
Have greater circulation
Reduce Inflammation
Respond better to stress
A 2014 Rutgers Medical School study published in Nature Medicine showed that acupuncture can directly stimulate the release of cytokines and dopamine and shows potential benefits for treating all inflammatory diseases.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140223131620.htm
