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CHRONIC INFLAMMATION AND AGING

Inflamation is a normal response of the body to foreign invaders like bacteria, viruses and other substances , particules or physical agents like the long term exposure to sun light .

The general inflammatory response is complex , including:

• The defeat of invading organism or other kind of antigen (foreign molecule that harms the body).
• Wound or tissue healing which is done with a clotting mecanism which stops bleeding , with the formation of fibrin, into which fibroblasts migrate and produce collagen to form a healing scar.

Inflamation is an inmune response of the body to molecules that the body feels are extrange to it and can be compared to a waterfall , for that it is called inflammatory cascade once it begins , it flows until it is resolve.

A lot of elements are involve in this inflammation cascade ( Table 1)

A number of factors may interfere with a successful inmune response:

1) Microorganism may adapt.

2) The host can be damaged by an excessive inmune response. Examples:

Blood trasfution or transplant rejection reaction; autoimmune disease ( Diabetes mellitus insulin resistant : autoantibodies against insulin receptors ; Rheumatoid Arthritis , Ig M, Ig G autoantibodies, it is not clear if the autoantibodies cause the disease or are a response to tissue damage cause by some other unknown factor )

3) The immune response may be underactive: Example: AIDS

When the inflammation does not resolve it becomes a chronic inflammation.
This kind of inflammation can be an invisible and causes harm to the body.

Chronic systemic inflammation is one of the causes of many seemingly unrelated diseases.
There are scientific evidence that correcting a chronic inflammation can slow the aging process.
Aging results in an increase of inflammatory cytokines that contributes to degenerative diseases progress.

"Chronic inflammation is also involved in diseases like atherosclerosis, cancer, heart valve disfunction, diabetes, congestive heart failure, digestive system diseases and Alzheimer 's disease". Other diseases like allergies, anemia, arthritis, fibromyalgia, heart attack, kidney failure, lupus, pancreatitis, psoriasis, stroke and surgical complication are diseases related to chronic inflammation.