Moderating Inflammation How to Calm Chronic Inflammation as We Age

This book has a simple goal: to set out practical, evidence-based ways to moderate inflammation as we age.That goal needs a word of explanation, because inflammation itself is not the enemy. It is one of the body’s oldest and most useful defenses. Inflammation is how we fight off infection and how we heal after an injury. Without it, a scraped knee would never close and a minor infection could become a fatal one.The problem this book addresses is a different kind of inflammation: a low-grade, smoldering fire that slowly rises with age and never fully switches off. Researchers have given it a name that captures both halves of the idea, inflammaging. It produces no fever and no visible swelling, yet it turns out to be a shared driver of many of the diseases that shorten and diminish later life.The chapters that follow look at vitamins, minerals, foods, polyphenols, and a short list of prescription drugs. Each substance is put through the same three questions:Does controlled research show that it lowers inflammation, and if so, by how much?At what daily dose?What are the trade-offs?Holding every substance to the same questions makes it possible to compare a fish oil capsule with a bowl of Greek yogurt or a daily statin, and to decide where your effort and money are best spent.Health advice is only as good as the evidence beneath it. Three rules govern every chapter in this part of the book.Only the last 20 years. All medical references are from 2006 or later. Older studies are not cited, so that the book reflects current research methods and current understanding.Only controlled studies. A substance must have been compared against a control: a placebo, usual care, or another treatment. Observational studies, case reports, and uncontrolled trials are excluded, because they cannot separate the effect of a substance from the many other differences between people who take it and people who do not. Meta-analyses are cited only when they pool controlled trials.Only absorbable substances. A compound that is powerfully anti-inflammatory in a test tube does little good if almost none of it reaches the bloodstream when swallowed. Compounds with low or very low oral bioavailability are therefore excluded from the chapters, however impressive their laboratory results.