Eating gelatin for joint health.

[Wise Old Owl]

Copied from Wellness article

You know how, over the past century or so, we’ve skewed our fatty acid intake by eating less animal fat and more vegetable oils, so that we’re getting way too many omega-6 fatty acids and not enough omega-3s, too many unsaturates and not enough saturates? In exactly the same way, we have been skewing our balance of amino acids, the building blocks of protein. Gelatin-rich foods, from bone broths to head cheese to foods like pig’s feet and ox tails, were a large part of a traditional diet. Our ancestors relished every part of the animal, and just as they ate organ meats that most modern Americans now spurn, they also ate all the gelatin-rich bony and cartilaginous bits of the animal. In this modern era of muscle meat and little but muscle meat — think boneless skinless chicken breast — much of this gelatin has vanished from the diet, but our bodies’ need for it has not.

For a long time, gelatin’s therapeutic effect in arthritis was assumed to result from its use in repairing the cartilage or other connective tissues around joints, simply because those tissues contain so much collagen. (Marketers suggest that eating cartilage or gelatin will build cartilage or other collagenous tissue.) Some of the consumed gelatin does get incorporated into the joint cartilage, but that is a slow process, and the relief of pain and inflammation is likely to be almost immediate, resembling the anti-inflammatory effect of cortisol or aspirin.
Ingestible Gelatin Pure gelatin can be ingested once or twice daily, including the use of Jello brand gelatin. It's best to buy the sugar-free kind, as weight gain is not advised in those suffering arthritis. Weight gain puts more stress on your inflamed joints. This form of gelatin can be bought at the grocery store, and is more time consuming than the pill form but maintains the same arthritis relief benefits.


Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/82882-arthritis-relief-using-gelatin/#ixzz2luXh67jg

[Pedaling Fool]

You really can't do a paleo diet unless you eat: Eyeballs, guts, bone marrow, bugs...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dn5ROQOzKs

[russb]

Hot Jello was a staple on our winter trips years ago. We loved it. What's not to love, it was hot and sweet. Awesome winter dessert. Seems to have fallen out of favor recently. I guess I should start having it again, you know for health reasons. ;)

[Wise Old Owl]

You really can't do a paleo diet unless you eat: Eyeballs, guts, bone marrow, bugs...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dn5ROQOzKs

This one - is much better.... kind of outside the thread... I was attempting to stay on track on the first page.

[jimmyjam]

Good info Wise Old Owl, I think I'll give it a try and see if it helps my old joints.

[Mountain Maiden]

I do lots of bone broths, marrow soups, etc., especially in the winter months. I agree that GELATIN is an important nutrition need. However, as much as I love Jello---it is laden with SUGAR which is NOT good for joint health. And, the sugar free (usually aspartame) varieties are realllly bad for arthritis. So it's a Catch 22---the benefit of one element is not worth the danger of another.

i have had some good success experimenting with natural fresh juice and Knox gelatin. Flavorful and healthy.

[Pedaling Fool]

Speaking of joint health, look at these stats: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/11/adding-pounds-then-new-knees/?_r=3



Excerpt:

"“It’s not a fit weekend warrior who has had a sports injury,” said Dr. Ayers. “These younger patients have significant pain and very severe functional limitations at the time of their total knee replacement surgery. They’re heavier and they’re sicker.”

The number of total knee replacements more than doubled in the past decade, from 313,618 in 2001 to 644,243 in 2011, according to national data. In patients between the ages of 45 and 64, the number jumped to about 274,000 from 102,000 in that decade. Younger people now make up 43 percent of all knee replacement patients, about an 11 percent increase in the last 10 years."


Disclaimer: The only thing that really caught my eye in this article are the numbers. I don't agree with their basic conclusion, only because I'm considered morbidly obese; I don't think the obesity issue is a significant of a factor as the lifestyle that led to their condition.


See ya later...Out the door to go pound my knees :sun

[Wise Old Owl]

I do lots of bone broths, marrow soups, etc., especially in the winter months. I agree that GELATIN is an important nutrition need. However, as much as I love Jello---it is laden with SUGAR which is NOT good for joint health. And, the sugar free (usually aspartame) varieties are really bad for arthritis. So it's a Catch 22---the benefit of one element is not worth the danger of another.

i have had some good success experimenting with natural fresh juice and Knox gelatin. Flavorful and healthy.

Well I have not heard the dangers of Aspartame - and the sugar does put the pounds on but unflavored Knox is 3x the price of Jello. What I have been doing is buying fresh fruit cutting it up and I just purchased sugar free Jello and making my own fruit jells. The fruit cups with jell are not the same.

Discovered in 1965, aspartame is a low-calorie sweetener that is approximately 200 times sweeter than sucrose. Aspartame is unique among low-calorie sweeteners in that it is completely broken down by the body into its components – the amino acids, aspartic acid and phenylalanine, and a small amount of methanol. These components are found in much greater amounts in common foods, such as meat, milk, fruits, and vegetables, and are used by the body in the same ways whether they come from aspartame or common foods.

Four Tips Towards a Healthy Diet and Exercise Plan (http://www.aspartame.org/four-tips-towards-a-healthy-diet-and-exercise-plan/)
Aspartame is one of the most thoroughly studied food ingredients ever, with more than 200 scientific studies supporting its safety. In addition to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) of the World Health Organization and Food and Agriculture Organization, the Scientific Committee on Food of the European Union (SCF), and regulatory agencies in more than 100 countries have reviewed aspartame and found it to be safe for use.
Consumer research shows that low- and reduced-calorie foods and beverages have become part of the lifestyle of millions of men and women who want to stay in better overall health, control their weight, or simply enjoy the many low- or reduced-calorie products available. Currently, aspartame is found in more than 6,000 products and is consumed by over 200 million people around the world. aspartame is made by feeding genetically modified E. coli bacteria, harvesting their protein waste (which contains the aspartic acid-phenylalanine amino acid segment aspartame is made from) and then adding methanol to the harvested proteins.
Aspartame has been found to be safe for human consumption by more than ninety countries worldwide,[27] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame#cite_note-Health_Canada-27)[28] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame#cite_note-FSANZ-28) with FDA officials describing aspartame as "one of the most thoroughly tested and studied food additives the agency has ever approved" and its safety as "clear cut",[29] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame#cite_note-29) but has been the subject of several controversies, hoaxes[4] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame#cite_note-Snopes1-4) and health scares.[30] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame#cite_note-30)The amount of methanol in aspartame is less than that found in fruit juices and citrus fruits, and there are other dietary sources for methanol such as fermented (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermentation_%28food%29) beverages. Therefore, the amount of methanol produced from aspartame is likely to be less than that from natural sources.

[Farr Away]

If you can find a natural-foods type store, they often sell unflavored gelatin by the ounce - much, much cheaper than the unflavored Knox gelatin packets. These days you could also find it online - although I've never shopped for it there.

[Praha4]

Owl, great topic, glad you brought it up. My orthopedic doctor has a P.A. who I saw a few months ago who recently worked in the Tampa, FL area, saw a lot of elderly patients down there. He recommended Knox gelatin as a natural supplement for joint health. (I also take glucosamine/chondroitin). He said some of their elderly patients in Tampa who were scheduled for knee replacement surgery started taking gelatin, and were able to cancel their surgery. I know this is anecdotal evidence, but good enough for me, I started back to eating Jello every day, don't know if it helps or not yet. My problem is an arthritic shoulder, my knees are fine. I just got another cortisone shot in my problematic shoulder yesterday from my ortho. The things we do in our 20s and 30s!!! argghhhh, an old injury to my shoulder, compounded by my crazy obsession with weight lifting in my younger days, all aggravated an early case of bursitis to advanced arthritis.... anyways I'm using gelatin, I'll do most anything to avoid shoulder surgery. Good luck with the Jello. Grandma's remedies sometimes work best.

[Wise Old Owl]

Ohhh that t's a great story thanks!