Word: chronically
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...Chronic inflammation also fascinates scientists because it indicates that our bodies may have, from an evolutionary perspective, become victims of their own success. "We evolved as a species because of our ability to fight off microbial invaders," says Dr. Peter Libby, chief of cardiovascular medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. "The strategies our bodies used for survival were important in a time when we didn't have processing plants to purify our water, when we didn't have sewers to protect...
...least that's the theory. For now, most of the evidence is circumstantial. (A few researchers think chronic inflammation can in some cases be good for you.) But that hasn't stopped doctors from testing the anti-inflammatory drugs that are already on pharmacy shelves to see if they have any broader benefits. What they've found is encouraging...
Problems begin when, for one reason or another, the inflammatory process persists and becomes chronic; the final effects are varied and depend a lot on where in the body the runaway reaction takes hold. Among the first to recognize the broader implications were heart doctors who noticed that inflammation seems to play a key role in cardiovascular disease...
...test his hunch, Ridker needed a simple blood test that could serve as a marker for chronic inflammation. He settled on Creactive protein (CRP), a molecule produced by the liver in response to an inflammatory signal. During an acute illness, like a severe bacterial infection, levels of CRP quickly shoot from less than 10 mg/L to 1,000 mg/L or more. But Ridker was more interested in the low levels of CRP - less than 10 mg/L - that he found in otherwise healthy people and that indicated only a slightly elevated inflammation level. Indeed, the difference between normal and elevated...
Cancer: The Wound That Never Heals Back in the 1860s, renowned pathologist Rudolf Virchow speculated that cancerous tumors arise at the site of chronic inflammation. A century later, oncologists paid more attention to the role that various genetic mutations play in promoting abnormal growths that eventually become malignant. Now researchers are exploring the possibility that mutation and inflammation are mutually reinforcing processes that, left unchecked, can transform normal cells into potentially deadly tumors...