BEAT ARTHRITIS!
In the US alone, there are nearly 22 million reported arthritis patients according to the Arthritis Foundation. That’s only the number of patients who have been medically diagnosed. Millions more have not yet been to the doctor to have an official diagnosis.
Its evident Western society has fallen prey to the rampant spread of joint and connective tissue disorders. Osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, gout, fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue disorders are the most prevalent forms of disability in the Western world.
Sadly there’s no end in sight to this misery if you depend on the current medical model for your treatment. For more than a century the major medical approach to joint and connective tissue disorders has offered little more than a mask of symptomatic relief.
This obsolete strategy allows the illness to progress beneath the mask. What’s worse is that the medical treatments often exacerbate and accelerate the progression of arthritis.
Get Ready To Beat Arthritis
As we move further into the new millennium, a fundamental shift is occurring in the medical treatments of arthritis and other joint disorders. It’s taken a long time to happen but finally the medical focus on arthritis is reaching beyond the narrow sighted goal of symptomatic relief.
It’s only been recently that physicians have begun to recognize that the long lasting-solution to arthritis is to actually provide the body with the structural materials to rebuild joints.
Increasingly, the prevention (and yes even the cure) of arthritis is within our reach. Intensive research in the last decade shows that the maintenance and restoration of the cellular matrix of membrane, cartilage and bone should replace drugs as the principle of intervention.
If you choose to follow my program and adhere to the strategies outlined in this book, I assure you that you will experience a physical transformation by the end of a year. In many cases the chronic pain of arthritis and joint disorders will disappear and you will enjoy life arthritis-free.
Joint Physiology
The construction and function of joints is pure engineering genius. Joints have been designed by the Master Builder to renew and rebuild themselves if we give them the right structural materials.
Visualize this: Your cartilage (pads of soft tissue that cushion your joints) contains cells called chondrocytes which renew bits continuously. Chondrocytes perform this magic by producing strong feathery threads called proteoglycans and strings of collagen fibrils.
These stringy components knit together to form a tough but spongy cushion of cartilage that reduces the shock of bone bumping on bone and stops the ends of the bones from rubbing each other raw.
The cartilage cushion the is lubricated by synovial fluid –joint oil, which enables the joints to slide effortlessly through their range of motion. Synovial fluid is produced by the synovial membrane, a slippery sheath which lines the joint capsule. The capsule itself as a strong and inelastic sleeve that seals the whole joint to the ends of the bones.
Figure 1:
Nutrition The Answer
Now consider what happens when the nutritional components required for the endless renewal and reconstruction of joints and connective tissue are not available. Any of three main conditions initiate and perpetuate arthritis.
They include:
- The rate of destruction of the cartilage exceeds the body’s capacity to replace it.
- Inflammation of the synovial membrane inhibits production of synovial fluid (joint oil)
- Toxic substances, such as uric acid, get into the joint.
Drugs Not The Answer
The long-term use of drugs results in the death of the affected joints and the ultimate replacement with crude robotic chunks of alien metal as owners of these joints will confide, are at best a hobble-de-hoy solution. Am I beginning to convince you that drugs are not the answer to arthritis as they have been cracked up to be by the pharmaceutical giants that produce them?
Excerpted from the book Win The War Against Arthritis -by Dr. Michael Colgan
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Renowned scientist, lecturer and best-selling author, Dr. Michael Colgan’s professional memberships include the American College of Sports Medicine, the New York Academy of Sciences, and the British Society of Nutritional Medicine. He is also on the Council of International and American Association of Clinical Nutritionists.
