Have you been experiencing symptoms of fatigue or low energy despite getting enough sleep at night?
Do you have brain fog or trouble remembering important details?
Do you find that you get sick easily or have trouble sleeping at night?
Are you prone to frequent headaches or stomach aches?
If you answered yes and you don’t know the cause of these symptoms, there’s a possibility that you’re suffering from something called chronic inflammation. As a Naturopathic Physician, I am uniquely qualified to help you get to the root cause and heal this condition.
Let’s get clear on the different types of inflammation!
Acute Inflammation
Acute Inflammation is your body’s normal and healthy response to a foreign intruder, or as a response to exercise or injury. When the body senses something foreign to the body, it reacts by sending white blood cells to dispel the foreign material.
Intruders can include things like thorns, irritants, pathogens, bacteria, viruses, and organisms that cause infections. In the case of acute inflammation, the body reacts for a short amount of time.
Chronic Inflammation
Chronic inflammation works differently. Instead of working quickly in response to an intense workout, injury, sickness, or bee sting, the body stays in an inflamed state for a long period of time. The challenge with chronic inflammation is that the natural healing process of inflammation is prolonged for too long.
The body is in a constant state of high alert trying to fight off something in your body to return to a normal state of health. This can lead to a host of other issues and is linked to many long-term and damaging conditions. According to an article published in the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), “Chronic inflammation is the most significant cause of death in the world.”
Dr. Mark Hyman, former editor in chief of Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine is quoted saying, “Inflammation is a key cause or factor in almost all chronic degenerative and lifestyle diseases.”
This low-level chronic inflammation can continue for years undetected in the body while still causing long-term damaging effects. Some of the health conditions include cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, type 2 diabetes, obesity, asthma, Alzheimer’s disease, autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and stroke.
What are your options?
There are a number of tests that my practice performs to help us better understand how the inflammation is presenting and the root cause of the chronic inflammation. Some of the tests include CRP test, ESR test, TNF-a test, IL-6 test, NLRP-3 inflammasome test, Plasma viscosity, plus a variety of additional diagnostics.
It’s not a simple one-step process -- there are parts of the body that alert the body that there is a need to act. There are other parts that respond to the threat (white blood cells), and the white blood cells release chemicals to address the invader. In a way, the body leaves behind a road map of sorts that doctors can use to discover if the process of inflammation is present.
None of the tests can perfectly diagnose chronic inflammation, but combined with symptoms and additional testing, they can help determine what is happening. We need to understand what is happening in YOUR body in order to come up with a treatment plan that is right for YOU!