Arthritis Treated with Alternative Medicine

Reiter’s syndrome is sometimes referred to as reactive arthritis, usually resulting from an infection , either urogenital or intestinal, it tends to follow an episodic and relapsing course.

The onset of Reiter’s syndrome may begin with a low-grade fever and diarrhea, conjunctivitis may follow some weeks later. Urethritis, conjunctivitis, and arthritis, may be present singularly, or all three symptoms may present together. Brown raised lesions may be found on the soles of the feet, other areas of skin may also be involved including scalp. Uveitis may be found in patients who have had the disease for some time, and is one of the more serious manifestations of the disease. It may range from an initial purulent conjunctivitis to keratitis, cataracts, and glaucoma resulting from repeated inflammatory episodes.

Small joints and feet may be affected, achilles tendon or plantar fascia.Other areas of the body may also be affected and commonly occur, skin, nails, mouth,inflammation of the glans penis, and inflammation of the uterine cervix.

Medical treatment for Reiter’s syndrome involves the use of NSAIDs, as the disease progresses there may be exacerbations followed by remissions. A large percentage of patients develop chronic arthritis, visual problems or urethral strictures. DMARDs ( disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs) may be used if the disease fails to resolve, and cortisone eye drops may be used if there is a uveitis.The disease may last from 3 to 6 months.

Alternative Medicine’s approach to treatment
Alternative Medicine’s approach would be to treat the cause of Reiter’s Syndrome, just treating the symptoms does not halt the progression of the disease. Reiter’s Syndrome occurs as a result of an infection, chlamydia trachomatis has been demonstrated to be the infective agent for the urogenital manifestation of this disease,and a number of bacteria have been shown to be involved in the dysenteric type.

Herbs for the urethritis: Uva ursi is a urinary antiseptic, and has been used successfully for inflammation in the kidneys, bladder, or prostate. Couch grass is a mild demulcent used to treat urinary tract infections. Celery is another urinary antiseptic and diuretic. Buchu, not to be taken during pregnancy,commonly used for urinary tract infections.Cornsilk is a soothing urinary tract remedy, it relieves irritation, and improves urine flow and elimination.

Herbs for the conjunctivitis: Euphrasia/eyebright relieves inflammation of conjunctivitis.

If you are taking prescription medicines, please consult your doctor before you take herbs of any description.

Homeopathic remedies for conjunctivitis: Argentum Nitricum 200c would be appropriate if there was a purulent discharge from the eyes, and it was difficult to open the eyes after sleep due to the lids sticking together.

Euphrasia 200c if the discharge from the eyes is thin, watery and profuse.

Intense itching of the eyes along with the above symptoms, Antimonium Crudum 6c.

Great redness of the eyes, very painful, Belladonna3c, Purulent discharge from the eyes, but the eyelids do not stick together, Argentum Metalliucum 200c.

Your diet should consist of fresh organic fruit and vegetables,nuts, and wholegrains.(organic wherever possible)No refined products or saturated fats should be consumed. freshly ground flaxseeds, cod liver oil, borage oil, blackcurrant seed oil, and evening primrose oil should be taken regularly, and virgin olive oil should be used for cooking. Avoid tomatoes, eggplants, capsicum, potatoes,spinach and rhubarb, for these can trigger flare-ups of the disease.

No diet drinks, or artificial sweetners of any kind should be consumed.

Cherries have been used by arthritis sufferers for many years to alleviate pain, and many studies have been done to support their claims. Cherries must do something for arthritis, for in 2005 the FDA moved to make companies take down their health claims about cherries. Obviously they were more keen for arthritis sufferers to be taking anti-TNFs, NSAIDs or the famous Methotrexate, all of these in some form or other will destroy your immune system, which is already compromised if you have rheumatoid arthrits, or send you to hospital with internal bleeding .Far better to eat a bowl of tart cherries to relieve arthritis symptoms.

“In a study involving rats, the researchers report that animals that received powdered tart cherries in their diet had lower total cholesterol, lower blood sugar, less fat storage in the liver, lower oxidative stress and increased production of a molecule that helps the body handle fat and sugar, compared with rats that didn’t receive cherries as part of an otherwise similar diet. All of the rats had a predisposition toward high cholesterol and pre-diabetes, but not obesity”.

“The chemicals that give tart cherries their red color may relieve pain better than aspirin and may provide antioxidant protection comparable to commercially available supplements like vitamin E, according to Michigan State University researchers. The new findings “suggest that the consumption of cherries may have the potential to reduce cardiovascular or chronic diseases in humans (such as arthritis and gout),” write the scientists”.

“Results of a preliminary study by ARS scientists and their university colleagues suggest that some natural compounds in plump, juicy Bing cherries may reduce painful arthritic inflammation. Eating cherries may also help lessen the severity of other inflammatory conditions, such as cardiovascular disease or cancer”.

In the above study ten healthy women volunteered to eat a bowl of 45 freshly pitted cherries for breakfast, they were not allowed to eat any other type of red berry for 2 days before the study began.It was found that the volunteers’ plasma urate levels decreased significantly over the 5 hours after their meal of cherries. Levels of urate removed from the body in urine increased over those 5 hours. The results indicate that cherries may be very benifical for the urate deposits which cause gout attacks.

Cherries are a rich source of antioxidants, anthocyanins, biflavanoids, perillyl alcohol and melatonin, all of which offer positive benefits to sufferers of arthritis, for these compounds in cherries scavange free radicals, prevent cancer and diabetes, and the melatonin assists sleep. Cherries are very beneficial not only for arthritis, but for all diseases, a more delicious solution to health problems would be hard to find.

Homeopathy heals the central disturbance of your dis-eased state. Sure, many so called homeopathic remedies are used in a palliative way, as is done in allopathic medicine. However, treating in this manner, such as using a remedy for arthritis, or a remedy for gout, or for a headache, is not what homeopathy is about. You may even get some relief for a while using remedies in this manner, but that is not cure.

Homeopathy, if used in the classical manner, cures disease, for it treats the person holistically, that is from the inside out. If you can accept that most diseases result from our reactions to the traumas in our lives, then you will understand that treating the emotions will cure the disease.

Many people visiting an homeopath for the first time, will find the long history taking and probing questions to be a very long- winded way to treat a disease. The time spent with a patient gives the homeopath time to gain insight into what may have been the triggering factor in the patient’s disease.

Rheumatoid arthritis is classed as an autoimmune disease, which means that your immune system, instead of safeguarding your health, has decided to attack you. The initial inflammatory process has gotten out of control, the immune system has lost its intelligence, and gone on an uncontrolled path of destruction.

This is where the homeopath will be searching long and hard for the causation of your disease. Most of us have had some, or many, emotional traumas in our lives, and it is here that one so often finds the beginning of the disease state. Many exacerbations of RA occur after having to deal with some stressful event.

Finding the trigger for the disease is no mean feat, many patients will require time before they can open up to reveal some long buried emotional trauma in their past.

Patients often say that unburdening themselves in this manner has proved to be curative, however, the homeopath has only touched the tip of the iceberg. What the homeopath usually finds is, that after much study a suitable remedy is found, one which bears the most similarity to this particular patient’s dis-ease state.

Unfortunately this is not often cause for celebration, for it may only treat one layer of the disease, just like the skins of an onion, the peeling goes on. Similar to a Sara Lee cake, there’s layer upon layer, one thing leads to another, and slowly but surely the entire disease is treated and the patient is returned to health.

We all look for a quick fix for our disease, but this not not the curative approach, for relieving pain with analgesics, is not curing the cause. It’s just alleviating the pain, while the disease continues to set up house.