Inflammation in the body is a scorching topic in medical circles. This body condition is associated with almost all chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, autism to dementia, and even depression. Other inflammatory diseases such as allergies, sun allergy, asthma, arthritis, and autoimmune diseases rise dramatically across the entire world population.
Doctors are taught to treat inflammation with aspirin, anti-inflammatory drugs such as Advil or Motrin, steroids, and increasingly strong drugs that suppress the immune system with severe side effects.
But doctors are not trained to find and treat the causes of inflammation in chronic diseases. Hidden allergens, infections, environmental toxins, an inflammatory diet, and stress are the real causes of these inflammatory conditions. Autoimmune diseases, specifically, impact as many as 24 million people worldwide, and they encompass rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, thyroid disease, inflammatory bowel disease, and others.
Autoimmune diseases treatment
Doctors more often deal with the suppression of symptoms with medication and do not solve the cause of the problem. It’s like taking large amounts of aspirin and standing on a nail. Treatment should be based on eliminating the cause.
If you want to calm the body’s inflammation, you must find its source. Extinguish the fire, not the smoke. In medicine, in most cases, we give a diagnosis according to the identified symptoms and not according to the hidden factors that cause them.
Functional medicine of the 21st century teaches us to treat the cause, not only the symptoms, and to ask ourselves why the patient is ill and not just what disease he is suffering from.
Conventional medicine and allergies
I recently participated in a group discussion with conventional medical doctors, rheumatologists, and patients with autoimmune diseases. One of my patients, who had a complex problem, also took part in discussing autoimmune disease by treating the cause.
The focus of other doctors was on suppressing the inflammation with medication and not finding and treating the cause. Functional medicine has another line of thinking and approaching the disease that helps us find and treat the real causes of inflammation instead of finding ways to reduce symptoms.
Autoimmune diseases are associated with a single central biochemical process that results in immune system response, also known as systemic inflammation. Your body begins to attack its own tissue.
Let’s get back to the conversation. When my patient described how he cured his autoimmune disease by finding and eliminating the causes of inflammation from the environment and his diet, the whole case was characterized as a “spontaneous withdrawal” accompanied with little interest with many anecdotes on the subject.
My patient could barely function from the many inflammations he had all over his body. Treating the hidden causes of inflammation now works very well without any inflammatory processes.
A story like this is not an anecdote but a huge guideline that determines how we should look for answers to our health problems.
What is actually autoimmunity?
In today’s article, I will explain what autoimmunity is, how the inflammatory spiral gets out of control, describing some of the basic causes of fire in the body, and I will also guide you through nine steps on how to reduce fire and overcome conditions that range from arthritis allergies.
We are facing an epidemic of allergies, asthma, and autoimmune disorders. Autoimmune diseases include rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis, celiac disease, thyroid disease, and many other syndromes that are difficult to classify.
These are all autoimmune conditions, and they are connected by a central biochemical process, more precisely by the reaction of the immune system in which it attacks its own organism.
Your immune system is the body’s defense against the occupiers. An internal army must clearly distinguish a friend from an enemy. Autoimmunity occurs when your system becomes confused, and your tissue finds itself in the crossfire.
Your body is fighting something, some infection, poison, allergen, food, or in response to stress. The immune system redirects its attack on the joints, brain, thyroid gland, stomach, skin, or sometimes on the whole organism.
This immune confusion stems from what is called molecular mimicry. Conventional approaches have no way to find the source of the problem itself. Functional medicine offers a way to determine the source of a problem.
What are the predispositions for autoimmune diseases and allergies?
Interestingly, autoimmune diseases occur almost exclusively in developed countries. People who live in developing countries without a modern way of life, including special filtration of running water, flushing toilets, washing machines, and sterilization of living space, do not get these diseases.
If you grew up on a farm with many animals, you are also less likely to get any of the above inflammatory disorders. Exposure to mud, dust mites, bugs, and animals train your immune system to recognize foreign and what is actually an integral part of your body.
Worldwide, autoimmune diseases are a major health burden. In addition to being the eighth leading cause of death in the female population, they shorten the average patient’s life expectancy by about 8 years. The annual cost of health care for autoimmune diseases is about 120 billion dollars, which is almost twice the cost of world health care for cancer, about 70 million dollars a year.
Treatment autoimmune reaction
Unfortunately, many of the conventional treatments can make the condition worse. Anti-inflammatory drugs such as Advil, steroids, drugs with reduced immune activity such as methotrexate, and TNF alpha-blockers such as Enbrel and Remicade can lead to internal bleeding, kidney disease, depression, psychosis, osteoporosis, muscle loss, and diabetes, not to mention severe infections and cancer.
When used selectively, these drugs can help people reduce symptoms and improve quality of life, but they do not represent a long-term solution. They should be used at the end of treatment until the inflammation has cooled by treating the disease’s cause.
There is another way to treat autoimmune diseases. I will share with you the story I told the doctors at that gathering.
I am his case of cure
My patient Sam completed a long adventure of the health system before he decided to visit me. For years he wandered from doctor to doctor and received various markers for his problem without real help in treating his illness.
This adventure has developed various inflammatory conditions, including chronic inflammatory infections of the sinuses and prostate. All the doctors gave Sam various antibiotics for his infections.
Shortly afterward, very severe chest pains appeared, and he ended up in the emergency room. While he was there, doctors found swollen lymph nodes, and he was told he had lymphoma, a form of cancer. Sam lived in despair for three weeks until the biopsy results arrived. It turned out that he did not have cancer but an autoimmune disease. What is an autoimmune disease? The doctors weren’t sure.
He has abnormal blood test results that included low levels of red and white blood cells, high levels of antibodies, high immunoglobulin, and indications of autoimmune thyroid disease. All doctors were left in doubt as to the cause of this abnormal condition of the organism.
Meanwhile, Sam developed a metabolic weight gain syndrome (before diabetes) due to constant inflammation in the body.
Here is a quote from the notebook of one of the specialists who treated Sam:
“Whether he has lupus or some other disease is completely unclear. Regardless, she needs observation without therapeutic intervention. “
This was, unfortunately, not the standard case. What exactly did they plan to observe? Or maybe they were waiting for him to be upstairs to intervene?
When he realized the hopelessness of his situation, he came to me. Using functional medicine, a new way of thinking about the basic causes and imbalances that lead to chronic disease, I began to ask Sam simple questions. Then I went hunting for poisons, allergens, and infections that are the most common cause of inflammation, and I found the real causes of its symptoms.
He took so many antibiotics that he disturbed his intestinal flora and bacteria, which caused an increase in yeast and its development. Fungi and yeast flooded his body, even starting to grow between his toes, on his feet, groin, and his scalp. He had Helicobacter pylori in their intestines. He had a susceptible stomach that reacted to many foods, including dairy products and gluten. He was exposed to toxins in his work and had a very high mercury level. He also had a chronic sinus infection.
How am I? treated Sema?
Then we started the general cleaning. I treated the yeast with anti-fungal preparations H. Pylori with antibiotics. He got rid of food that causes allergies in his stomach, sorted out his intestinal flora, detoxified it from metal, and cleaned his sinuses.
Then I helped him treat his immune system by adding some nutrients, zinc, fish oil, vitamin D, various herbal preparations, and probiotics. I introduced him to a healthy diet, which did not produce allergic reactions to the anti-inflammatory diet.
After the entire treatment and his visit, I asked him how he felt, expecting him to say that he was better. His answer surprised me because he said he felt great.
He lost about 10 kilograms, and when his laboratory findings came, his blood count results were completely normal. His white blood cells increased, and his immune markers calmed down.
Sam’s results reflected a new model of thinking, functional medicine.
Protect your child from allergies
Although allergy predisposition is inherited, there are a few things we can do to reduce the likelihood of allergies and alleviate the discomfort that allergies cause in a child:
Allergen free and in utero
Especially if there is a predisposition to allergies in the family, you can reduce the baby’s risk of developing allergies by reducing exposure to allergens during pregnancy. This is especially true for food allergies. Avoid highly allergenic foods: hazelnuts, eggs, cow’s milk, and shellfish (sometimes even wheat and soy)
Breastfeed your baby
Asthma and other allergies are less common in breastfed babies. Breastfeed often and for as long as possible to protect your baby. The American Academy of Pediatrics and the WHO recommend breastfeeding as an ideal diet for 6 months of life. Breast milk contains protective IgA antibodies that the baby’s intestines do not contain. IgA antibodies reduce the occurrence of nutritional allergies. Unfortunately, there is not enough evidence that breastfeeding prevents the development of allergies later in life.
Delay the introduction into the diet of foods that can cause an allergic reaction
Dairy products, especially cow’s milk, should not be given to children under one year of age. Postpone hazelnuts, egg whites, and shellfish until they are two years old.
Clean the room where the child sleeps
Regular cleaning and ventilation of the room where the child sleeps will reduce allergenic particles’ presence in the air.
Allergen-free cot
Remove fluffy stuffed animals and stuffed toys from the crib, avoid woolen and feather pillows and blankets. Try anti-allergy pillows and mattress covers. A crib board can also cause allergies if treated with formaldehyde during production. Check with the manufacturer to see if your bedroom furniture is made of formaldehyde-treated wood.
Smoking is not allowed.
Do not allow smoking in your home or near a child. Now that you have become a parent and you have a good reason to eliminate these limiting habits. “But I only smoke outside,” you might rationalize – anyway, you ingest allergens from smoke on your hair or clothes and expose your child to them as you hug and cuddle him. You could, very politely, say to your doctor, “Our doctor says she’s very allergic to tobacco smoke.”
Postpone going to the nursery or kindergarten
Research shows that kindergartens are more likely to suffer from respiratory infections (ear, sinus, asthma) that can worsen allergies. The impact of kindergarten on allergies also depends on other factors such as. How many children stay in how big space and time children spend outside. If possible, choose a kindergarten that is attended by smaller children and has larger rooms and a kindergarten where children spend a lot of time outside.
The home located away from allergens
If your child suffers from allergies and you have allergies in the family when choosing a location for the home, you should avoid:
· Proximity to motorways or roads with weighty traffic.
· Proximity to areas where weeds grow like ragweed.
· Areas with trees whose pollen causes allergies.
· Older houses with damp and moldy rooms.
· Wet basement apartments.
Clean the nose
The nose is the entrance for allergens. Make it a habit to clean your baby’s nose daily with saline or sprays containing seawater.
What do if you have a autoimmune disease?
If you have an autoimmune disease or allergies, here’s what to think about and what to do.
Check for hidden infections caused by viruses, bacteria, yeast, and fungi. If you find them, the doctor should treat them with certain medications.
Ensure you are not allergic to certain foods with food tests designed to eliminate most allergens containing certain foods.
Test for celiac disease, which is tested by taking blood.
Perform heavy metal toxicity testing. Mercury and aluminum, as well as other heavy metals, can cause an autoimmune reaction.
Fix your stomach and check for symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome.
Use fish oil, vitamin c, vitamin d probiotics to calm the autoimmune reaction naturally.
Exercise daily is a natural way to eliminate inflammation.
Use relaxing methods such as yoga, deep breathing, massage as stress activates the immune system.
Give this treatment system a chance and focus on your inflammation. After a while, you will feel that your inflammation is slowly decreasing and that your body’s functionality has significantly improved.
