Age is the final frontier for all of us. No matter what we do we will age daily. The aging process doesn’t manifest it daily. It takes months or years to look and feel older. It takes years, in many cases, for an age-related disease (cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s disease, hypertension, Parkinson’s disease, Type II diabetes, cancer, and many more) to be diagnosed.
Ninety percent plus of all disease begin at the cellular level. Chronic low-level inflammation begins and is not abated. Even if you wanted to diagnose a disease, it would not show up on any test. However, inflammation can be measured by the highly sensitive c-reactive protein test. It is a simple, low-cost blood test. Something as definitive as your body’s level of inflammation is left off most annual physicals. Why? I’ve wondered that for a long time.
If left untreated, chronic low-level inflammation can eventually become something serious. If you knew you had high levels of inflammation in your body, you might be able to do something. But, we don’t know and take no corrective action to treat it. Most doctors would prescribe a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug if they knew and recognized it as something worthy of being treated.
Anti-inflammatory diets (DASH and Mediterranean are two) and foods (many – Google them) are well-known. Yet, doctors cannot prescribe a food or diet plan because they have not been approved by the FDA. Yet, if you asked your doctor to monitor your progress on an anti-inflammatory regimen, he/she would probably do it. If we don’t know what to fix, how can be start and measure progress?
Over time (years), chronic low-level inflammation can become a serious disease (heart disease, stroke, autoimmune disorders, and others). How many times have you heard of a person being diagnosed with cancer and having six months or less to live? Their cancer has grown to the size of apple or larger and never been detected. Awareness, education and action are required to combat and conquer diseases associated with aging.
