Discover which herbs are great for mitigating inflammation, plus how they actually work to reduce cellular stress and get to the root cause of the problem. Learn more about herbs for daily use here.

Video Transcript

Question: What herbs are good for inflammation?

Dr. Rawls: What inflammation is, is excessive cellular die off, right? So if you twist your ankle, you damage cells in that area, and you have excessive cellular die off, and that die off creates debris and congestion around cells. And you can’t have that because that blocks flow of nutrients and fluid.

And it also blocks flow of the cells ability to get rid of toxic waste and metabolic waste. So you’ve got to have good flow. You’ve got to have fluid circulating around all your cells all the time. So if you’ve got excessive die off, then it causes congestion in tissues, and that’s what happens with an injury.

So, the body’s response to that is to send in cells called macrophages, which are basically garbage collectors, so they go in to clean up all this debris and congestion, but they do it by gobbling that stuff up and breaking it down with potent acid and free radicals.

So if you’ve got a lot of cellular die off, then you open up your vessels, and you bring in all your white blood cells and macrophages, and they’re breaking all this stuff down. And then you have activation of microbes that are jumping in on the mess because all of that is food. You’ve got all this congestion and mess in your tissues.

So if you have bad health habits, if you’re eating a bad diet, chronically stressed, not sleeping, have excessive toxin exposure, etc., you’ve got excessive die off in all of your tissues. So all the tissues in your body, your brain, your heart, your muscles, your joints, are all getting congested with debris and congestion and junk from dead cells, and macrophages are moving in and bringing in acid and potent free radicals, and it gets to be a mess, and you feel horrible because you have total cellular stress in your whole body.

So what’s the best thing for that? Herbs. Which herbs? Any herbs? All herbs. All herbs work by protecting cells from cellular stress. So all herbs have some anti-inflammatory properties because they’re neutralizing free radicals, getting rid of toxic substances, increasing blood flow, dilating the space so you can clear that congestion, killing off microbes that have been reactivated in that area.

So all herbs are going to do that. Some herbs like turmeric also tone down the body’s inflammatory response. So the body isn’t quite so aggressive, and you have a lot of herbs like that. So our immune-modulating herbs like reishi and rhodiola, and you know, the list goes on and on.

All of those herbs, virtually all herbs have anti-inflammatory properties, but it’s not like a drug that just blocks a part of the immune system. So ibuprofen is anti-inflammatory, right? Ibuprofen blocks one enzyme that basically reduces the ability of the immune system to mount an inflammatory response. Does it do anything to reduce cellular stress or clean up the mess left behind by the dead cells? Nope. Not a thing.

Turmeric does. Turmeric blocks that same enzyme, but it also protects cells and helps clean up the mess. So while you’ll find that the herbs aren’t as potent as ibuprofen sometimes, you know you sprain your leg or something like that, ibuprofen can really give you an edge on things.

But boy, you should be taking the herbs, and you should continue taking the herbs because they are going to have a long-term, anti-inflammatory effect that isn’t going to cause side effects, like taking ibuprofen chronically.

Discover more in Dr. Bill Rawls’ new #1 Bestselling book: The Cellular Wellness Solution: Tap Into Your Full Health Potential with the Science-Backed Power of Herbs.