by Lorelei Cohen

Created on: January 04, 2009   Last Updated: May 30, 2010

The diet of an arthritic person can actually be the reason why they are ill, or at the very least, it can be a major influence on the degree of illness that they suffer from. There is definitely a right diet, and a wrong diet, for arthritis sufferers to participate in. It is an absolute fact that specific foods can irritate symptoms of Arthritis, just as certain foods can alleviate some of the inflammation, or other symptoms involved with Arthritis. 

Foods are very commonly associated with forms of Arthritis such as Rheumatoid, Lupus, Scleroderma and other autoimmune forms of arthritis which have had some patients show significant improvement when food specific diets are followed.

It is believed that some inflammatory based types of Arthritis are initiated or irritated by a diet which is high in fats such as those found within red meat, oils, and margarine. Studies have proven that cox-2 enzymes within the body cause more inflammation when there is a higher imbalance between the omega-6 fatty acids and the omega-3 fatty acids in the body. Decreasing your intake of foods containing omega-6 fats (saturated and trans-fats) and increasing your intake of omega-3 fats (flax seed, walnuts and oily fish) can help to reduce this imbalance. Rather than frying foods, broil or pouch them, eat lean white meats and fish in place of high fat beef to help decrease the risk of inflammation caused by a fat imbalance.

Although dairy products are the number one offender, other foods that rank high on the list of possible triggers for inflammatory based illnesses are corn, wheat, oats, rye, eggs, citrus fruits, nuts, sugar, salt, coffee, and nightshade plants such as tomatoes, potatoes, red, green and chili peppers, eggplant and tobacco. The only way for you to know for certain if one or more food products are the root cause of your illness, is to eliminate these risk foods from your diet plan, and then watch for any improvements to your health.

If you believe that you may be having problems consuming a specific grain product such as wheat, then take extra care when eating other more healthy grain products such as oatmeal, many times a cross contamination will occur between the various grains during their growth, harvesting, or packaging phases.

It is suggested that individuals who suffer from Gout, Osteoarthritis, Rheumatoid or other autoimmune illnesses, should not consume plants from the nightshade family. Arthritis and nightshade plants don't work! It is the alkaloids

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