Benefit for Oxford Degenerated Discs from Pumpkin Leaves
This time of year, pumpkins are all over the place! We like them for décor, but they offer so much more! News of late focuses on the benefits of their leaves to slow disc degeneration and even possibly encourage regeneration. That’s news to your Oxford chiropractor’s ear…and surely to our Oxford back pain and neck pain patients’ ears, too!
THE DISC – Healthy and Degenerated
Most treatments of back pain focus on easing the pain and returning function without a thought about how to slow the degenerative process and/or promote regeneration. The intervertebral disc has an inner core (nucleus pulposus) made of proteoglycans and a layered outer rim (annulus fibrosus) rich in collagen. Combined, these two act as a shock absorber and stabilizer for the spine. Treatment options for the degenerated disc come from being aware of the processes that precede degeneration so as to help alleviate discogenic pain more effectively. (1) Your chiropractor probes these mechanisms all the time!
PUMPKIN LEAVES AND CAROTENOIDS
It's well-known that pumpkin products and by-products (like leaves!) contain major carotenoids - β-carotene, α-carotene, lutein and zeaxanthin – with β-carotene being the foremost one in most pumpkin varieties. The total content of carotenoids depends on many factors, one being the extraction procedure. Functional foods are advanced from carotenoids which are said to add significantly to the numerous health benefits of the foods. (2) Nutrition can plan a role in disc health. Let’s put our Oxford pumpkins and their by-products to work for us!
PUMPKIN LEAVES AND COLLAGEN AND PROTEINS AND DISC CELLS
One way to put pumpkins to work for us is well explained in a recent study regarding how the leaves of pumpkins may help. The acetone extract from Violina pumpkin (curcurbita moshata) leaves brought about a significant increase in extracellular matrix components like aggrecan and collagen type II as well as other proteins and stress response regulators in the degenerated intervertebral disc cells taken from degenerated disc tissues of spinal surgery patients. Markers noting the presence and activity of stem cells were significantly increased as well. This news motivated the researchers to declare that the hypothesis about how enough stimuli can support resident cells to repopulate the degenerated discs was thereby reinforced. The report overall concluded that data indicate that the discovery of molecules that may effectively slow disc degeneration using a part of the pumpkin that most of us throw away as waste – the leaves! (3) Satterwhite Chiropractic bets you will look at the pumpkin leaves differently this season!
CONTACT Satterwhite Chiropractic
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. James Cox on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he describes how nutrition may slow and possibly avert degeneration and stimulate regeneration via ingredients like chondroitin sulfate based on years of research performed already and how nutrition in combination with The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management decrease and manage spine pain. We’ll keep watching the pumpkin leaves’ research as it evolves!
Schedule your Oxford chiropractic appointment now to visit us this pumpkin season!
