Recent research seems to suggest that a number of health conditions may arise from a common cause called inflammation. Every one of us has had some kind of inflammation at one point or another in life. Inflammation is an immunological defense mechanism that fights against parasites like bacteria and viruses when they invade the body. It is a transitory phase that helps the body to recover quickly. However, there are times when the condition prolongs even after the threat is dealt with. That is when inflammation begins to cause damage to the body.
The condition could be triggered by a number of factors like genetic predisposition, high blood pressure or habits like smoking and drinking. Researchers are under the opinion that their studies seem to indicate that chronic inflammation can give rise to a number of diseases. They say that Alzheimer’s, cancer and heart disease could all be the result of inflammation.
For medical researchers, the idea of having to deal with a single cause for all diseases is certainly encouraging. Instead of finding a cure for every disease, they can now focus of healing inflammation which would then become a common cure for all other diseases. In other words, if it were indeed true that Alzheimer’s, cancer and heart disease were caused by inflammation, then treating inflammation effectively will also prevent or cure the other three diseases.
Inflammation was much more essential for survival in the ages past when hygiene and sanitary conditions were quite poor. The reduced need for this defense mechanism in today’s environment seems to make it over responsive. Certain aspects of the modern day lifestyle like lack of exercise and high intake of saturated fats and sugars also makes the body predisposed to becoming inflamed.
Researchers are now focusing their attention on anti-inflammatory drugs being sold in the market today, to see if they have benefits beyond what they had been originally designed for. Some studies seem to be encouraging. For instance, Celebrex is an anti-inflammatory drug to treat swelling in arthritis patients. Researchers have concluded that the drug helps prevent intestinal polyps too. They are now conducting several clinical trials to see if the drug also has an effect on preventing breast cancer, Lou Gehrig’s disease and delaying memory loss.
While it is still too early to say for certain that inflammation is really the silent killer, a number of studies seem to point in that direction. But if inflammation turns out to indeed be the cause behind most of the diseases today, it could be the best medical discovery in recent times. Finding a good cure for inflammation could then be able to prevent or cure a whole gamut of diseases for which there are no effective cures in medical science today.
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