That redness and swelling that happen to an insect bite or a wound is called inflammation. To be exact, doctors refer to it as acute inflammation. This article, however, will discuss a different form of inflammation, the kind that you cannot observe because it is taking place inside your body.
Make sure that you share this article on your different social media sites to let your family and friends know about chronic inflammation and its dangers, as well as its various causes.
Persistent inflammation and low-grade inflammation — these are the other names for chronic inflammation. No matter what it’s called, one thing remains the same, and it’s the fact that it’s taking place inside your body, and it’s something that can put your health in danger as there are so many diseases and conditions that are linked to it.
Commonly, the cause of chronic inflammation is the immune system itself. Doctors say that sometimes the immune system attacks healthy cells of the body when it should be dealing with invading microbes only.
When the immune system targets harmless cells that are mistaken for as enemies, inflammation within the body happens. One very good example of this is osteoarthritis — the immune system attacks the tissues of the joints, causing them to become inflamed. As a result, the joints become painful and swollen, and also damaged in the long run.
Unfortunately, it’s not just the tissues of the joints that the immune system may attack, but also many others. It’s exactly for this reason why chronic inflammation is linked by the experts to so many different health problems, ranging from obesity, diabetes, osteoporosis, heart disease to cancer.
According to doctors, it’s not just the immune system that can be blamed for chronic inflammation, but a bunch of other things, too. And some of them we are actually inflicting upon ourselves!
Here are some of the causes of chronic inflammation other than the immune system itself:
Uncontrolled Stress
Stress causes the body to release a hormone called cortisol, which helps in controlling inflammation. The levels of cortisol in your body gets higher and higher the more stressed you are, and also the longer you are stressed.
Well, you may say that it’s actually a good thing because with cortisol chronic inflammation won’t strike. Alas, experts say that having sustained high levels of cortisol within can make your body less responsive to it after some time. And when an inflammation finally strikes, cortisol may already be powerless.
Pro-Inflammatory Foods
Some of the foods that you put in your mouth can be the ones that are causing chronic inflammation — they’re what experts are referring to as pro-inflammatory foods.
Many of these pro-inflammatory foods are part of the everyday diet of a lot of people. Anything that is deep fried, processed and loaded with sugar can be regarded as something pro-inflammatory. Needless to say, everyone’s favorites such as French fries, chips, donuts and muffins can trigger chronic inflammation.
Certain Medications
Did you know that there are a lot of medications that can put an end to certain problems alright, but then cause all sorts of other issues in the process, and that includes chronic inflammation?
Some good examples of those are non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs or NSAIDs. While their name says they are for dealing with inflammation, the truth is taking them in high doses and for extended periods of time can cause inflammation to the liver. The benefits of the intake of NSAIDs (and other drugs) should outweigh the risks.
Cigarette Smoking
Everyone knows that cigarette smoking can increase a person’s risk of lung cancer and heart disease. However, not a lot of people know that it’s something that can cause chronic inflammation, too.
According to experts, every puff that a smoker takes irritates the lungs, triggering a small-degree inflammation. It is believed that this inflammation is the one that can trigger lung cancer to strike in the first place. The good news is inflammation markers tend to drop dramatically the moment a person quits smoking.
