This blog is about both acute and chronic types inflammation as well as healing and repair and infections. Inflammation is a process that is of vital importance to human health and human disease. Inflammation can be resolved through the primary reaction of acute inflammation and result in human health or can develop into chronic inflammation and result in human disease.
Inflammation is the body’s normal protective response to an injury,irritation, or surgery. Acute inflammation is normally a favourable response despite that the result can be uncomfortable or painful. Every person walking this earth today experienced some sort of inflammation during their life time whether it was minor or severe. For every injury that our bodies experience inflammation follows, it is the initial response of the body. Being an active person and a rugby player I tend to pick up knocks and injuries quite frequently, the most common injury of all has to be a sprained ankle. I have had a problem with my ankle since the age of 18 years and every time the injury healed I tend to injure it again within every new season. However, after the injury occurred I noticed that it displayed the cardinal signs of inflammation, there was swelling(Tumor) associated with great pain(Dolor) and redness(Rubor) as well as heat(Calor) as the swelling goes down when ice is pressed upon it and was very painful to walk on(functio laesa). It takes about two weeks if not less for the twisted ankle to heal fully provided that the ankle is left stress free. This is an example of acute inflammation. The redness and heat is due to the increased blood supply with vascular dilation which is the first bodily response. It is also useful to note that the heat generation that results from hyperaemia has an added effect of killing some foreign pathogens as these pathogens cannot survive under this warmer temperature (Biology Online, 2011). The swelling is due to oedema caused by the exudation of fluid from vessels into the tissues. The fluid that causes the oedema contains antibodies which are are used to eradicate foreign pathogens that may have entered and the increase of fluid into extracellular spaces. The pain may is due to the oedema which causes tissue tension and pressure on nerve endings. The release of chemical mediators may also cause pain. The loss of function may occur following the swelling and pain or following inflammatory destruction of tissue (Rippery, 1994). Below is a picture of a sprained ankle that displays all the cardinal signs.
After acute inflammation occurs a few things may happen. This involves healing and repair, suppuration and chronic inflammation. The one that occurs is dependent on how the tissue is damaged, the cause of the damage and the type of tissue at the site of injury(Rippery, 1994).
Healing and repair involves three stages where the damaged cells are replaced by living ones. The first stage is resolution where complete structural and functional repair occurs, the second stage would be regeneration, where restoration of parenchymal cells with some loss of normal tissue structure and lastly organisation where loss of tissue replaced with granulation and fibrous tissue resulting in the formation of a scar. Heres a video that better explains the process of healing and repair.
So far I have been using my ankle injury as an example of acute inflammation. I will use this example further by looking into classification of inflammation. The classification of inflammation includes the nature of injury, the site of injury and the duration of the inflammation. I would classify the inflammation I experience each rugby season as acute in duration with mild serous exudation as a sprained ankle is a moderate condition. However if a sprained ankle is left untreated or is further damaged it could cause tendon injuries which include tendonitis or swelling around the tendons. Therefore acute inflammation may go on to develop into chronic inflammation. Chronic inflammation is ‘a long lasting inflammation (weeks or months) due to persistent aggressive stimuli and is characterized by: active inflammation with mononuclear cells, tissue destruction and repair. It can follow acute inflammation or can be chronic right from the beginning’ (Danciu, 2012). A good example of chronic inflammation would be rheumatoid arthritis, where the immune system attacks the lining of the membranes that surround your joints. The resulting inflammation thickens the synovium, which can eventually invade and destroy the cartilage and bone within the joint. The tendons and ligaments that hold the joint together weaken and stretch. Gradually, the joint loses its shape and alignment. Below is a picture that further demonstrates the condition.
In conclusion, I am amazed once again on our bodies ability to achieve homeostasis. Inflammation is the bodies first step to heal and thus restores human health. If inflammation is left untreated or ignored disease will occur. Therefore, the mechanism and cells involved in inflammation were made to increase health and reinstate homeostasis to the body.
References
Rippey, F F. (2012) ‘General Pathology’, Johannesburg, Witwatersrand University Press.
Martini and Nath. (2009) ‘Anatomy & Physiology’, San Francisco, Pearson Education.
Biology Online, 2013. Hyperaemia. [online] Available at: www.biology-online.org [Accessed 08 April 2013]
News Medical, 2013. What is Inflammation. [online] Available at: www.news-medical.net/health/What-is-inflammation.aspx [Accessed 08 April 2013]
Women to women, 2011. Inflammation. [online] Available at: www.womentowomen.com [Accessed 08 April 2013]
clinicalscienceblogshuaib 