Arthritis Remedies and Treatment Overview

ARTHRITIS

WHAT MAKES IT WORSE?

Nerve pain or wind bi (shifting pain, neuritis, neuralgia)	Stimulants; exhaustion; drying, hot, or irritating foods; aggravation; worry; anger
Hot bi (inflammatory arthrits)	Acidic foods; hot spices; alcohol; hot emotions (rage, jealousy)
Cold bi (rheumatism)	Exposure to inclement weather: cold foods; iced drinks; anti-inflammatory drugs
Damp bi	Humidity; phlegm-producing, low-nutrition diet; weakness; depression; hormone imbalance
Rheumatic arthritis	Infection wind-cold-damp and hot-damp
Rheumatoid arthritis	Wind-cold-damp, malnutrition, weakness
Osteoarthritis	Malnutrition; exhaustion; chemotherapy; hormone imbalance; immune-threatening illness

WHAT MAKES IT BETTER?

TYPE	EXAMPLE	TYPE OF HERB	EXAMPLE
Nerve pain wind	neuralgia	Nervines, herb combinations for local relief	Valerian
Inflammatory arthritis (chill stage) (hot stage)	Early rheumatoid cold-hot-wind-damp	Drying/warming nervine, increase circulation, antiphlegm	Myrrh
Knees, pain, and stiffness		demulcent	Yucca capsules
Knees, lower-body joint pain, swelling	hot-cold-wind-damp		AH&HR Guan Jie Yan Wan
Osteoporosis		Nutritive tonics, anti-inflammatory herbs	Antler 8, Restorative Tablets, Eucommia 19

Arthritis Treatments-Help For Osteoporosis

We tend to think of osteoporosis as a disease of age, a menopausal complication. But it is also encouraged by blood deficiency that can occur at any time form cancer therapies, corticosteroids, blood disease, severe blood loss, and weak adrenal strength. These contribute to malabsorption, fatigue, and poor immune response.

If you have osteoporosis or wish to prevent it, nutrition and blood-building are just as important in your health-care routine as cleansing. Certain tonic herbs enhance the body's ability to generate what make bones strong-- blood and bone marrow.

One popular remedy in china is thinly sliced deer antler, now sold in Chinese pharmacies in the West as well as Asia. Deer antler is shed yearly. It is quite effective in rebuilding bone marrow depleted by harsh medical therapies or illness. If you ever go to the trouble of simmering sliced deer horn for hours in a double boiler, you will feel the benefits immediately. It feels as though your bone marrow is relaxing, taking a deep breath, and sighing from relief. Several types of deer horn are used. Cervus sika stag horn contains protein and collagen and is used as a tonic stimulant. Antelope horn contains calcium phosphate and is an antispasmodic, antipyretic (anti fever) tonic.

Fortunately, a less expensive vegetarian substitute is now available. Simmer one handful each of epimedium leaves and lycium fruit (Goji Berries) in a quart of water for twenty minutes, strain, and drink two cups a day.

Arthritis Pill Treatments
For treatment of osteoporotic pain, Chinese traditional doctors recommend herbal combinations that nourish kidney/adrenal energy and generate blood production and at the same time build chi, help balance hormones, and prevent pain. This multifaceted approach requires combining one or two main herbal remedies along with others that deal with secondary complaints.

Start with two combinations by Seven Forest that nourish kidney and liver blood and bone marrow: Antler 8 and Restorative Tablets. (Your health-food store can order them)

The first of these contains 50 percent deer antler and less then 10 percent salvia, dendrobium, rehmannia, tortoiseshell, tang kuei, aquilaria, and cardamom. Antler 8 provides nourishment and support for persons from Western cancer therapies, corticosteroids, HIV, leukemia, severe blood loss, fatigue, kidney-related problems, and osteoporosis. It helps generate blood and bone marrow.

Combine this with Restorative Tablets for osteoporosis and osteoarthritis. Restorative Tablets reduce heat symptoms such as afternoon fever or hot flashes. Men or women can use it for prolonged feverish diseases and general weakness related to internal heat. It is cooling because it replaces moisture with 10 percent each of processed human placenta, tortoises shell, and rehmannia. It contains antifever herbs such as anemarrhena and ophisopogonis as well as other blood-building herbs.

A vegetarian substitute for this remedy could be the less expensive Chinese patent remedy Liu Wei Di Huang Wan which builds blood (and yin) for kidney and liver.

Antler 8 and Restorative Tablets or their equivalents ensure blood production and nutrition necessary to slow inflammatory and consumptive symptoms of a long term inflammatory disease.

Additions For Specific Problems

Add to Antler 8 and Restorative Tablets the following combination for specific problems: Ganoderma 18 for fatigue and low immune strength.

Nature's Sunshine products, from Spanish Fork, Utah, offers two formulas used to balance the Water element: Qu Shi (“Remove Dampness”) and Jian Gu (“Strengthen Bones”). The first, which treats edema in the legs, poor digestion, and joint swelling, is more for cleansing. The second, as its name implies, is more of a supportive remedy. Jian Gu is recommended for weak and sore back and legs, urinary dysfunction, recovery from broken bones, osteoporosis, exhaustion from work, and difficulty in hearing or breathing related to kidney (adrenal) weakness. Both formulas are vegetarian and are best taken between meals.

By merely reading the list of symptoms these herbal remedies treat, we clearly see that osteoporosis is more complicated than we thought. By the same token, there is much more we can do to prevent or treat it than lift weights and take calcium pills when we remember.

Medicine For Arthritis-Other Types of Joint Pain Remedies

Homeopathic Arthritis Remedies

The homeopathic remedy most suited for joint pain that improves with warmth and exercise is rhus tox 30c. A dose, usually 5 pills, can be melted under the tongue or added to drinking water between meals.

Rub On Arthritis Remedies

Triflora Arthritis Gel, made by Boericke & Tafel, Inc., is widely available. It is recommended for pain and stiffness associated with arthritis, rheumatism, tendinitis, backache, and sprains. It contains a number of homeopathic remedies, including rhus tox and ledum. I use it to increase circulation in stiff shoulders.

If joints feel better with the application of heat, rub in Tiger Balm: one of the world's most widely available liniments, it can be found online and in pharmacy’s almost everywhere.

For inflammatory pain, apply real ice or a cooling cream. But be very careful where you put it. Ice on the back and neck can sedate vital internal organs more than ice on the fingers.

You may wish to rub painful joints or gout with a cooling oil. Use sunflower or sandalwood oil. An acupuncture doctor in China might treat such symptoms with acupuncture of the red joints, pricking until slight bleeding occurs. That “lets out the steam” of excess acid collected at the joints. But I recommend using a loofah or a skin brush gently on painful joints and along the entire spine during a hot bath.

Herbs for Arthritis-Herbal Arthritis Remedies

Arthritis herbs come as single herbs or as combination remedies. You'll find them not only in health-food stores, but frequently in pharmacies, supermarkets, and health clubs. Curative herbs are no longer a specialty item. Several of the largest American vitamin manufacturers are now making and distributing combinations that feature a wide variety of international herbs.

For Painful Knees

One of the best single herbs for painful knees I have found is yucca root, a relative of the century plant, native to the American Southwest. Many people eat the boiled root in place of potato, but a stronger dose is obtained form capsules. It contains saponin, a naturally occurring steroid.

The consistency of yucca root is slick, like soap, so that yucca capsules, taken internally  make joints slip more easily and reduce selling. You can take handfuls of yucca capsules between meals throughout the day. Only you can find the dose that makes you feel comfortable: the manufacturer hasn't a clue about the severity of your pain. A dozen or more capsules, taken for two or three days, is often enough of the dosage to unlock painful knees. That frees chi to move. Then reduce the dose to a comfortable number. For example, 4 to 6 daily.

Combination Arthritis Remedies

American-made combination herbal remedies for arthritis often contain both cooling and warming herbs along with others that increase circulation and support hormone production, This put-it-all-together approach has become popular because Western consumers are not expected to differentiate their symptoms as Asians do. The wisdom in such a combination is that combining a variety of such hers can break apart stuck chi. These combinations are safe and recommended for long-term use, not acute attacks. As you will see, using Asian energetic principles, you can improve upon their approach.

Alternative Health & Herbs Remedies Arthritis is easy to find in supermarkets and pharmacies. AH&HR is a well-put-together combination of support and cleansing herbs that improve pain and mobility.

It combines buckthorn bark and burdock root to help maintain hormone balance, along with many herbs such as yucca, parsley,  slippery elm bark, and yarrow flower to treat pain, and alfalfa and cayenne pepper to supplement the nutrition. It presents a balanced diet of building and cleansing herbs necessary to ease sharp pain and swollen joints. This is a good remedy that covers many bases at once.

Using the genius of Asian medical principles, you can take such a baseline combination as this, and add a few other herbs to take its pain-relieving action to where it is most needed in the body. In other words, my herbal additions will make the baseline remedy work more specifically.

• For shoulder pain and stiffness, take 6-12 drops of  AH&HR along with one cup of tea made from 1/8 teaspoon each of cinnamon and turmeric powder.

• For swollen, painful knees take  AH&HR with a tea made by boiling a handful each of Chines fu ling and stepahia root boil the Asian herbs for 45 minutes in one quart of water, strain it, and drink 3 cups per day, each time also taking 6-12 drops of  AH&HR as the baseline remedy.

• For painful lower back and lumbago, add a handful of eucommia bark to cook with the above two herbs.

FOR IMPROVED MOBILITY

Kaishore Guggulu combines Commiphora mukul, Terminalia chebula, Terminalia belerica, Emblica officinalis, Tinospora cordifolia, Zingiber officinale, Piper nigrum, Piper longum, Embelia ribes, Operculina turpethum, Baliospermum montanum, Ghrit, Gumacacia that help neutralize acid and increase mobility. In addition, Embelia ribes and Ghrit (precursors of estrogen and progesterone) supplement hormones while Emblica officinalis and Tinospora cordifolia enhance nutrition. Kaishore Guggulu  treats arthritic inflammation and pain of the lower body, such as gout, sciatica, lumbago, and numbness in the extremities that is more severe at night and that worsens in damp or cold conditions.

Kaishore Guggulu treats wind/dampness anywhere in the body. Symptoms might include headache, numbness, pain malaise, and fatigue. It is recommended for arthritic discomfort in persons over thirty years old, especially after exposure to internal cold, wind, or dampness.


INFLAMED JOINTS AND SKIN RASH


Sometimes joint inflammation becomes so intense that it spills onto the skin, leaving an exasperating itchy rash. In treat case, anti-inflammatory cleansing must be augmented. You can use a health-food store arthritis remedy as a baseline and combine skin-cleansing herbs.


Kaishore Guggulu is a strong live cleanser, suited for long-term inflammatory pain, a red tongue with a coating, and swollen or deformed joints at the hand, wrists, or knees. It breaks apart toxins and cools internal heat. AH&HR is gently cleansing useful for weak or older persons with fragile bones.


You can combine either remedy with the following tea in order to treat painful itchy skin rash, or eczema. Make this laxative, antibiotic tea by boiling a handful each of dandelion herb and honeysuckle flowers (ordered online) in 2 quarts of water for 45 minutes. Strain the tea and keep it in the refrigerator when not in use. Drink 2 cups daily of the tea, along with a dose of your baseline remedy. If the combination of tea and pills becomes too laxative, reduce the tea to 1 cup daily.