Knee “Arthritis” Disappears – Shockwave Treatment, Food Intolerance or Gut Health?

An 81 year old male came into the office complaining of bilateral knee pain which most importantly was making it difficult for him to run the bases and playing softball that he loves. He was told by his orthopedist that he could have a knee replacement on his right knee whenever he was ready….or when the pain gets bad enough! The patient also had knee pain when he climbed up stairs. He was eating dairy products daily (i.e. milk, some cheese) and was eating eggs several times per week. He was also on two hypertensive medications and carrying a “good size belly” where he could easily lose 15-20 lbs. He also had a chronic fungus infection on both of his feet. He applied Aspercreme® to his knees for pain temporary pain relief.

When he came in he already had some pain reduction in his knees after a few days on the diet. After the first treatment I put him on an anti-inflammatory pea and rice protein meal replacement 2 scoops twice daily ( Inflamx ) with a mixed meal and snacks from foods off my BED Diet (see acceptable food list ). Because of his chronic foot fungus (and believing this mostly comes from the gut ) I put him on a Fluconazole (anti-fungal medication) 200 mg per day for 14 days. I had him take 2 pills twice daily of an anti-inflammatory joint support supplement called Freedom Joint Support Formula and gave him a shock wave treatment to both knees using both the Focused and Radial shock wave devices.

So we’ll do somewhere between 3 to 5 EPAT treatments 5-7 days a part and see what happens. My hope is he continues to lose weight. My bigger goals are to not just getting him to be pain free so he can play better soft ball (which is really important), but have the patient continue to lose weight and eventually within 6 months to a year get him off his two blood pressure medications. If he is open I would like him to do the 5 day per month Prolon – The Fasting Mimicking Diet for the next 3-6 months to get him to that space of weight and blood pressure normalization, as well as the benefits that come along with fasting (central weight loss, lipid reduction, glucose stabilization, inflammation reduction, increased autophagy and stem cell stimulation).

Well this is my “wheel house!” In 1983 in the first medical practice I worked in in Marina Del Rey (yep 38 years ago!) every new patient was put on a green vegetable smoothie mixed with psyllium seed husks and a few vitamins for two weeks. I saw all kinds of conditions improve on this relatively extreme elimination diet – joint pain, inflammatory bowel disease, bloating and digestive disorders, constipation, sinus congestion, headaches, “foggy brainess”, muscle aches and many more common symptoms people go to a doctor for. Lesson? …food intolerance can cause any and many symptoms that we dismiss as “normal.”

Shock wave therapy (focused and/or radial – I use both in each treatment) has the following physiological effects which can cause pain reduction immediately but more importantly the healing response continues over several weeks. So there can be immediate improvement that wears off in a day or two, but is less than when you started. Then over the next 3-5 treatments every 5-7 days the process of pain reduction and healing continues from the mechanisms below. ( See Shock Wave Benefits and Function )

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