John Arts Abundant Living www.johnarts.co.nz

COPD – chronic obstructive pulmonary disease – refers to a group of degenerative lung and airway diseases which include emphysema, chronic bronchitis and bronchiectasis. These are similar to asthma, in that they involve narrowing of airway passages making breathing difficult. The difference is asthma is generally reversible, while COPD is considered degenerative and irreversible. Respiratory problems such as asthma and COPD are very serious and people with these problems should be under medical care. My comments here are designed to be implemented alongside medical treatment.

I had a personal brush with COPD – suffering from chronic bronchitis and early stage bronchiectasis for 10 years. After 15 years of good nutrition and targeted nutritional therapy, I no longer have these problems. From personal experience and helping thousands of others, we should never underestimate the power of the body to heal once we feed it what it needs.

There has been a significant amount of research into the disease processes in COPD. One excellent paper titled ‘The role of oxidative stress in the pathogenesis of COPD: Implications for therapy' (Rahman et al 2005) concluded chronic inflammation and oxidative stress are important features in the airway destruction in COPD. By inflammation they refer to the local immune cells in airway passages producing significantly greater amounts of inflammatory chemicals. This causes the airway narrowing.

Oxidative stress basically means local antioxidant defences cannot deal with the amount of free radicals being produced. The free radicals produce inflammation and to make it worse – inflammation produces even more free radicals. These twin processes drive the destruction of airways. The researchers conclude with comments about the role of antioxidant therapy in COPD.

Introducing therapeutic quantities of various anti-inflammatory nutrients, we effectively starve the immune system of the ability to produce inflammation. There are a number of natural anti-inflammatory nutrients that have positive impact on airway passages. Secondly, we can introduce broad spectrum antioxidants which help the stretched defence systems cope with the free radical onslaught driving airway destruction and narrowing. During the years, we have seen many people with respiratory problems such as asthma and COPD get some real improvements in their quality of life. I cannot give specific recommendations here, but feel free to contact me for nutritional advice applicable for your circumstances.

John Arts is the founder of Abundant Health. If you have questions or would like a free
health plan phone 07 578 9051 or 0800 423 559 email john@johnarts.co.nz or for more product information visit www.abundant.co.nz
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