Olympic answer to joint pain
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LAST year’s Olympic and Paralympic Games showed us just how far you can push the human body at its peak.
Now Olympic physiotherapists and premier league football coaches are recommending turmeric as the best way to keep joints in lifelong working order.
A turmeric supplement is being used to reduce the risk of inflammation caused by intensive training, and for treating damaged joints without exposing athletes to the problems caused by over-the-counter painkillers.
It has already been used by soccer stars from FC Barcelona and Athletic Bilbao, and is being tried out at Barcelona’s Olympic Training Centre as well as in other centres in Britain and France.
‘We are always looking for something that’s better than paracetamol or aspirin, which don’t work very well and cause side-effects,’ says Francek Drobnic, head of research at the Barcelona centre. The powerful effect of the plant extract on joint health has also been welcomed by doctors, who are concerned about the effects of long-term painkiller use.
The rise of turmeric came about because many scientists noticed that populations with high intakes of turmeric as a curry spice have lower rates of arthritis and joint damage.
The key element of turmeric, called curcumin, comes from the underground stems of the turmeric plant. Scientific studies found that turmeric works by interrupting mechanisms involved in joint inflammation and arthritis.
These are also being targeted by pharmaceutical companies working to produce their own drugs likely to do the same thing as turmeric.
Until now it has been difficult to boost the body’s absorption of natural turmeric sufficiently for it to have a really rapid effect on aches and pains.
That has all changed with the launch of a formulation, supported by Cambridge scientists, that combines turmeric with soy lethicin. This combination, which now has 22 published clinical research papers to confirm its effect, is 30 times more ‘bioavailable,’ or better absorbed, than natural turmeric alone.
Longer term studies are expected to show that the turmeric formulation is the most effective treatment for joint health currently available.
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