Chronic inflammation and the Dietary Connection

In my previous article, “Age-Related Macular Degeneration & Supplements,” I talked about AMD and its prevention by eating lots of leafy green vegetables and other low glycemic carbs, besides taking some supplements.

I’m grateful to Paula for making a comment about the research she and others are doing in research labs at Washington University School of Medicine.  They’ve found that there is an autoimmune component.  While I had never before read about an autoimmune connection to AMD, I wasn’t surprised because I’ve read many articles and books that link inflammation and autoimmune problems to diseases  such as diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, asthma, obesity, allergies, cancer, etc.  As Jack Challem wrote in his book The Inflammation Syndrome, “Chronic inflammation underscores and promotes virtually every disease, affecting millions of people, and yet inflammation also is a symptom rather than the fundamental cause of these diseases.”  Chronic inflammation can lead to autoimmune problems, and there is a genetic predisposition to such conditions.  He goes on to say that “chronic inflammation is caused by an injury to the body combined with nutritional imbalances or deficiencies.”  We’ll see why leafy greens and other low glycemic carbs are very beneficial versus the high-glycemic diet that is the typical American fare.

Inflammation in the toes

Chronic and Silent Inflammation

Inflammation is a normal and necessary biological response to harmful stimuli, like microorganisms, injured tissue, and other foreign objects.  Without the acute inflammation response, wounds would never heal.  However, chronic inflammation can lead to the diseases mentioned above and many others, including premature aging.  The Wikipedia article on inflammation has a section on “Inflammatory disorders,” Like many articles and books I’ve read, this article states that proteins are involved in inflammation.

While chronic inflammation may create a painful disease, such as arthritis, silent inflammation (chronic in nature) causes no pain, but it goes about causing silent damage to the tissues in the body.  Physician Neil F. Neimark, on his website Expert-Anti-Aging-Advice.com, talks about silent inflammation and how it can affect anyone: overweight or thin, abs-of-steel, etc.  He lists the tests for silent inflammation in their order of importance:

1. The gold standard test is the ratio of arachidonic acid (AA) to eicosapentanoic acid (EPA): (AA/EPA)
2. Fasting insulin levels also help quantify your level of silent inflammation.
3. Triglyceride/HDL Ratio is a secondary biomarker for silent inflammation.
4. Highly Sensitive C-Reactive Protein (hsCRP) is currently the most “popular” and well known test for silent inflammation.
5. Body Fat or Waist Measurement provide an indirect assessment of silent inflammation, because they reflect insulin levels.

As stated in the great article “Inflammation,” “The chronic and continuous low-level demand that silent inflammation places on the body’s defense systems results in an immune-system breakdown.”  The body can become confused and start attacking itself, creating an autoimmune situation.

Grains, Legumes & Dairy

The more I researched nutrition, the more I read about the problems with eating many grains, legumes, and dairy.  Please read my article “The Trouble with Eating Grains and Legumes.” All three food groups have proteins that mimic the body, which tend to cause autoimmune diseases, and they have anti-nutrients that prevent the absorption of nutrients.  Also, the grains and legumes, both seeds, have high amounts of omega-6, an inflammatory fatty acid.

I stopped eating grains and then realized that my symptoms when I ate them all went away.  Not only do I have celiac disease, gluten intolerance – an autoimmune disease, but also I have a more broad-based grain problem.  I gave up legumes and realized my gas, bloating, and other digestion problems went away.  The only food allergy that I had previously suspected was dairy since my pediatrician took me off that when I was a child.  Sure enough, I had food allergy testing (delayed-response type) several months ago, and dairy was one of many others.

Little did I know that I had silent inflammation, which had been damaging my body.

Anyone with a family history of autoimmune disease is more at risk for developing at least one or more.

Insulin

If you want to control your weight and achieve good health, you must control your insulin levels.  Insulin is a hormone that regulates carbohydrate and fat metabolism in the body.  When insulin is dominant, it tells the body to store the food as fat.  The counterbalance hormone is glucagon, which, when dominant, tells the body to burn fat for energy.  When blood glucose rises, insulin is needed to remove excess glucose from the blood.  Carbohydrates are broken down into glucose, so if you eat too many carbs or too many starchy or refined carbs, they will spike the blood glucose and, hence, insulin.  Too much insulin is damaging to the body in many ways and can create silent inflammation, so controlling insulin is key to good health.

Controlling Inflammation through Diet

Sample information from NutritionData website

It’s important to eat a low-inflammation diet, which means balancing carbs, protein, and fat with an emphasis on leafy greens and other low-carb foods, along with good quality proteins and fats.

My favorite nutrition site for determining food quality is NutritionData.com, which has not only the standard food label-type values for thousands of foods, but it also has some other very beneficial information, such as the Estimated Glycemic Load™, Inflammation Factor Rating™, omega-3 and omega-6 values, plus other nutrient levels.  For the purposes of this article, though, I wanted to concentrate on the Estimated Glycemic Load™ and the Inflammation Factor Rating™ since both play a role in inflammation.

The Estimated Glycemic Load™

The Estimated Glycemic Load™ is actually a better way of understanding how much a serving of a particular food will raise one’s blood sugar than than the glycemic index (GI).  GL = GI/100 x Net Carbs (Net Carbs are equal to the Total Carbohydrates minus Dietary Fiber.)  In the information for a serving size of 172 g of Black Eyed Peas, the The Estimated Glycemic Load™ is 13.  (This is based on the serving size you choose, in this case 172 g.)  While anything below 10 is considered low and above 20 high, for diabetics, people who want to lose weight, and people who want to eat a low-inflammatory diet, they need to keep the numbers as low as possible.  NutritionData says that the typical total target for the day should be 100 or less.  People in the three categories I mentioned should be much lower than that.

Inflammation Factor Rating™

Inflammation Factor Rating™ is a very handy system created by Monica Reinagel, a noted nutritional researcher who has studied inflammation.  Negative numbers mean a food is inflammatory while positive numbers mean the food reduces inflammation.  (This is based on the serving size you choose.)  According to NutritionData, you should achieve at least a 50/day or higher.

Compiled List of Some Common Foods

Using numbers from NutritionData, I created the table below.  Please note that a food, like spinach, that is strongly anti-inflammatory can cause inflammation in people with allergies.  That’s what happened to me.  Spinach, garlic, beets, broccoli, bananas, blueberries, dairy, many legumes, grains, etc. create allergic reactions in my body and, hence, inflammation.  I had no idea that the veggies and fruits were causing me problems until I had an IgG blood test.

To normalize the portion size for comparison, I used a size of 100 grams, which equals 3.6 ounces.  The grains, along with most of the oils, are the most inflammatory groups; however, certain other foods might stand out in a single group.  Leafy greens, like kale, spinach, and collards are highly anti-inflammatory.  Fish and fish oil are also highly anti-inflammatory.  It might be surprising to know that some vegetables and many fruits are actually inflammatory while beef, was for the most part anti-inflammatory.

Check out some inflammation-reducing recipes.