Food And Arthritis

Add the RIGHT foods to your diet to REDUCE arthritic pain and inflammation.
Include the WRONG foods to your diet and INCREASE arthritic pain and inflammation.
My choice? A life-journey based on a low-oil whole-food plant based diet.
Whatever your current state of health, make yourself healthier - you deserve it. Start your plant based diet journey today.

Thursday 9 February 2017

Remission Dawns

According to the website arthritis.org remission the American College of Rheumatology and the EULAR developed criteria defining remission from RA in 2011. These criteria are used by scientists when conducting clinical trials. They are:
  • One or fewer swollen joints 
  • One or fewer tender joints 
  • An assessment by the patient that on a 0–10 scale, arthritis activity is 1 or less 
  • A blood test showing little or no inflammation in levels of C-reactive protein, a key marker of inflammation 
I am very glad to report that my latest blood test (just last Monday) showed my CRP coming in at just over 9 mg/L. At its worst in April 2016 my CRP was over 170, and just last month it was around 25.

Since the other criteria are largely true, accordingly I will very soon be in remission, possibly next month! I attribute my progress down to drugs to halt the problem, to diet and exercise to resolve the problem.

Apart from continually improving my health, I have two final goals regarding remission. The first is to remove myself from RA medication. The second is to re-introduce some foods back into my diet that I had restricted myself from. The latter I have already started with successfully eating "normal" potatoes (with no side-effects and some oils. I will continue with the latter by re-introducing foods back on a weekly basis, or thereabouts.

The medication reduction I will do after discussing the subject with my doctor. That will happen slowly because methotrexate is a seriously dangerous drug and is not to be treated lightly. But it will happen. I anticipate some blips of pain or inflammation as I reduce the methotrexate, but also anticipate these will be temporary.

We will see.

9 comments:

  1. Such great news Andy. Keep it up!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Highly skeptical Andy.

    Having suffered with inflamatary bowel disease most of my adult life, in the 1980's I too investigated food alergies, read all the books, went to see several "Clinical Ecologists" did the lamb and pear elimination diet for two weeks, then slowly introduced other foods. It was all nonesense - except the "Doctors" (none of them are, in the UK they have an MBBS degree only) were were making a lot of money out of this; powerful stuf I swalowed it whole.

    The problem with all this stuff is its bad science relying on anacdotal evidence only; no theory. A sound theory requires: 1) a testable hypothesis to a known confidence level, with known PDF of the data 2) An explanation why 3) A formalisation (maths) followed by a proof 4) Validated predictions.

    Its true there is a lot of bad food about packed with sugar. Is this causing the epidemic of type 2 Diabetes? The begining of a hypothesis. For decades we were told, "Oh my god dont eat fat", now we are told fat is OK. All the headlines in the popular press come out with this stuff.

    Andy your CPD test: explain why certain foods effect it, lets see the statistical tested data, lets see the formalised model and a proof. Human bio-chemistry is very poorly understood. No one really knows how aspirin works, though in the past ten years it has been shown (?) to effect COX2 enzimes (Cycloxigenase), but why? no one yet knows. Yet aspirin has been used for two hundred years.

    Still if you like your new diet, and it makes you happy, then thats fine. But please ignore all the stuff you read in books like Dr Aggrwal. No one really understands why joints become inflamed, or bowels become inflamed. Drugs are empirically tested, but they dont understand how they work.

    Phil the skeptic.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Phil, Your requirements for good science makes sense. I recommend http://nutritionfacts.org where every analysis is backed by published research. So for instance there you can find the claims about the benefits turmeric and get directly to the relevant research from the links provided.

    There is lots of misinformation out there, and I have done my own soul-searching trying to decipher what is really backed by science and what is quackery. In the end each must make their own conclusions and decisions. I went with the Paddison Program because there is a lot of good science to support its approach, and yet it is not geared as a money-making machine. Yes, Clint gets an income from it, but his main income is derived elsewhere. Just google him.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hello Andy

    Yes I looked at http://nutritionfacts.org - I smiled since this is just typical of the nonsense that Americans like Michael Greger "MD" come out with. Notice how he asks for "donations" and how he wants you to buy his book.

    Who has ever heard of him?
    Ask him how much research grants he had last year?
    Ask him to produce peer reviewed papers - but be careful, 99% of science research papers in the USA are rubbish (quite a few in the UK too) - I just had a quick look on the site, I did not see one scientific reference.

    I lived and worked in the USA for two years, the home of the snake oil salesmean. You must not be taken in by this stuff. Its all bullshit. I swallowed this stuff when I was young. Homeopathy, astrology, spiritulism, transendental meditation, religion - all nonsense - but note how they all want your money.

    I remember Andy you selling your cassette deck and other items - you wanted to learn how to levitate! Your Indian guru used to drive around in a Rolls Royce! Alas the General Theory of Relativity explains how mass warps space time. There then exists a gravitational field between the masses which produces an inverse square law force between them - and no amount of "om naddy paddy hom" will effect it Andy.

    There seems to be a lot of people who are easily taken in, and these people no it.
    Like William Riech, who convinced people of "Organon" a mysterious force which spreads throughout the universe.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Having started out by saying you were taken in, I get the distinct feeling you do not agree with anything anymore.

    Who has ever heard of him? His book is one the 2016 NY Times best sellers
    https://www.nytimes.com/books/best-sellers/2016/01/03/advice-how-to-and-miscellaneous/?_r=0
    so I think that answers that question.

    A quick look on the site? The site is stuffed full of citations, so I fear you must have had your sunglasses on.

    Phil, while I welcome your comments, you will not win your argument by reducing it to "pub banter."

    ReplyDelete
  6. Well yes, and Linda Goodmans "sunsigns" was one of the worlds best sellers, when it came out in the 1970's - so what? Nonsense Astology. Human beings are divided into 12 types? Still at least thats better than Psychology, which has only 4 types - another pseudo quack "science" of the worse type.

    Citations, especially of the USA type, as I noted above - 99% are tripe. They sound good and contain lots of technical words (most of the people who glance through them dont understand). Andy I am not trying to slay your beliefs. I dont care what you eat, but I do demand the truth.

    In the 1990's I too did some research: twice at DERA (Fort Halstead and Malvern) and once for a start up (nSine). I read a lot of research papers and PhD dissertations. I repeated a lot of the work. I went to visit these prople: Prof Van Hee (Delft), Prof. Dr Habil Dostert (Karlsrue), Dr Holger Philips (Braunsweg), Manfred Zimmerman (Karlsrue). At first I was a bit in awe of these people. Then I began to look more closely and repeated some of their work. To my great shock I found that most of it was fiddled - I was particularly shocked at the PhD work, which is peer reviewed. I wasted 9 months at nSine doing this.

    So you see I am not impressed by research papers and citations. Where a professional engineer has to design something, get it working, show that it is reliable - these comedians just fill filing cabinates up with paper. Few people read them intensly and repeat the work. They are made deliberately obscure - and no one likes to admit that they don't understand it. The proof of the pudding is in the eating thereof and not the paper recipee.

    Quite what "pub banter" is ? Perhaps you can explain.

    Anyway we all have our own beliefs, I like to think mine are based upon true science, not popular stuff and alas fake fiddled science. These people who sell this stuff are good at brainwashing people and extracting their money.

    Andy I know I keep poking you with this (sorry), but did you ever get to levitate by using your TM? I thought that if you did TM you didn't get ill? Or all crime would come to an end? Do you still give 10% of your income to the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi?

    You have done TM most of your life and likewise a vegetarian. Your health has been no better or worse than the next person.

    Every Sunday in Church around the UK, people in the service pray for the Queens health - alas her health is about average.

    Well good luck with your whole plant diet!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Pub banter is discussing my personal life. In a pub I have no problem with such jocular humour. But on a public website, without prior agreement it shows that you are having difficulty understanding boundaries, and I am very sorry for you. It is not that I am ashamed or whatever about my history, but on this website it easily turns into some personal assault. That is not acceptable.

    When Dr Greger cites peer-reviewed papers that means nothing to you? Just because you had an alarming research experience does not discredit the entirety of science.

    On the subject of belief, I believe that I was in a wheelchair / housebound around April 2016. So my health faired worse than the average person, and that despite my long-standing vegetarian lifestyle. The onset of rheumatoid arthritis has thus caused me to deeply question myself and to do very full research. I am happy with that research. I followed its conclusions and am now in remission. Not a bad result!

    It may have been that your own dietary research was somehow flawed. I would have strongly advised against both lamb as a started food in any elimination diet. Also your elimination diet seemed to last just two weeks. Whatever it failed. Mine went on several months - and succeeded.

    This blog is aimed at those who are interested in seriously debating its subject matter. There is a whole world-wide web for you to make personal comments against me that I have no control over. If you comment on this blog again please make some reasoned non-personal comments, otherwise I will not allow it to be published.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Andrew

    Forgive me for any offence.

    Still see https://www.researchgate.net/publication/21579302_Food_intolerance_in_rheumatoid_arthritis_II_Clinical_and_histologial_aspects

    Note para 1: "clinical trials have found conflicting results" and "9 out of 78 found an outstanding effect" - so the other 69 did not. Poor evidence, possibly placebo effect.

    Now Andrew please dont take offence. I have known you for 40 years. I like you and respect you, but not a lot of your ideas, like TM, vegetarianism etc. You are lucky, not a lot of people like me!

    I am very sorry you have had RA, which I know is very painful and debilitating. I think what happens with a lot of people, they get ill, go to their physician, and find that the help is limited. So they turn to alternative methods. I did 40 years ago, but I found it was just a money grabbing exercise, playing on peoples mysery. The lamp and pear diet was from a specialist NHS allergist, who used to charge £50 a time.

    Anyway we should stop the discussion. If you believe in it, then do it, if it makes you better.

    But dont pay them any money.

    People who do TM, tell me you dont need a mantra. You can sit and let your mind wonder to acheive deep relaxation. Still there are people who still pay out $2500 for a mantra, an Indian word eg: “Aum”, “Om”: Sanskrit/Hindu, meaning “It Is” or “To Become”. “Ham-Sah”, “So Ham” (often pronounced “So Hum”): Sanskrit, meaning “I am THAT etc.

    I hope you remain in remission and yourself and Leslie are happy.

    Phil

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks Phil. That is a useful research paper and clearly shows the complexities and challenges for anyone doing food trials, even with the double-blind etc status. One of the interesting notes I have picked up over my recent personal tests is that whole fruit I can eat with abandon. While juicing that same fruit can cause me problems, even with the pulp as a smoothie. So presumably same nutritional input, different output!

    That's why I restate that the only thing that matters is what works and does not work for the individual. Any number of research papers no matter of what quality cannot compare to personal experience. The only rider is that a body may respond differently to foods at different times. In my early days of going through my own elimination process there were foods that caused me relatively small arthritic problems. However I persisted and over time, as my body improved its gut health or whatever, those problems subsided and I was able to move with confidence to other foods.

    That very detailed process worked for me. After three months my diet was substantially varied and tasty and relatively safe. After about six months I think I visited my first restaurant and that presented a whole new learning curve of fighting RA. Now I can visit any restaurant and come out confident that I will have no RA side effects.

    Even now - and in the future - I refine my diet. I listen to my body whatever I eat or drink. Each day I feel safer, happier and healthier and more in control of my RA.

    That is the legacy of the Paddison Program. Yes, much of the science both for and against may be challenged. But there are consistent threads that lead me to have confidence in the Paddison approach. The results of my own personal experience are outstanding.

    Without this approach for sure I would have been on an increasing range of expensive drugs for the rest of my life along with a likelihood of related health challenges in future years such as osteoporosis.

    As to the cost, it took me some time to decide to make the payment. I elected to go for it because it was not expensive and was fully refundable with a 100% satisfaction money-back guarantee. So I had absolutely nothing to lose, or am I missing something?

    ReplyDelete