This is an essential publication because it supports the benefits of diet in providing symptom relief in fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis.

In a nutshell those suffering with fibromyalgia or rheumatoid arthritis experienced a substantial improvement in their conditions when they switched to a raw, vegan diet. Specifically, they experienced a decrease in pain and stiffness and self-perception of their health was improved.

The problem, of course, is that this diet represents a substantial and some would say extreme departure from our ‘normal’ diet. A vegan diet includes no animal products whatsoever – no milk, eggs, butter. The “living food” diet studied here included only raw foods – no cooking whatsoever.

The obvious reality is that very few people will ever attempt such an extreme dietary modification, and fewer still will adhere to it. Nonetheless, it is one option, and might result in general improvement in conditions related to inflammation other than those specifically studied.

As an alternative, one might want to add more fruits and vegetables to the diet, especially fresh, raw fruits and vegetables. Supplements might be considered as well.

The publication:

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Toxicology. 2000 Nov 30;155(1-3):45-53.

Antioxidants in vegan diet and rheumatic disorders.

Hänninen, Kaartinen K, Rauma AL, Nenonen M, Törrönen R, Häkkinen AS, Adlercreutz H, Laakso J.

Department of Physiology, University of Kuopio, Finland.

Summary of the abstract

Plants are rich natural sources of antioxidants in addition to other nutrients. Interventions and cross sectional studies on subjects consuming uncooked vegan diet called living food (LF) have been carried out. LF is an uncooked vegan diet and consists of berries, fruits, vegetables and roots, nuts, germinated seeds and sprouts, i.e. rich sources of carotenoids, vitamins C and E.

The efficacy of LF in rheumatoid diseases was studied as an example of a health problem where inflammation is one of the main concerns.

The subjects eating LF showed highly increased levels of beta and alfa carotenes, lycopen and lutein in their sera. As the berry intake was 3-fold compared to controls the intake of polyphenolic compounds like quercetin, myricetin and kaempherol was much higher than in the omnivorous controls.

Those with fibromyalgia who changed to the LF diet experienced a decrease of their joint stiffness and pain as well as an improvement in perceived health and quality of life.

Rheumatoid arthritis patients eating the LF diet also reported similar positive responses and the objective measures supported this finding. The improvement of rheumatoid arthritis was significantly correlated with the day-to-day fluctuation of subjective symptoms.

In conclusion the rheumatoid patients subjectively benefited from the vegan diet. The improvements were consistent with objective measures.

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