July 07, 2023 by EMPWellness Admin
What is acute inflammation and what are its symptoms?
It is better to first understand what inflammation is before looking at the acute inflammatory response. Inflammation is an important process in the body that occurs with the cooperation of the immune system.
Inflammation may not be completely defined; But, for simplicity, it is better to say that inflammation is the body’s response to a pathogen or a traumatic process such as an injury. Inflammation is a vital process; Because it protects the body.
Acute and chronic inflammation
When creating a traumatic condition or a disease or any event that causes inflammation, the body quickly reacts to it and inflammation occurs. In this case, it is said that the inflammation is acute.
Now, sometimes this inflammation lasts and may exist in the body for months and years and even cause complications. In this case, the inflammation is chronic, like the condition that occurs in rheumatism. Acute and chronic inflammation have differences in cause, mechanism and symptoms.
What is acute inflammatory response?
The acute inflammatory response is an innate (non-specific) and rapid response to physical injury and damage that follows a fixed pattern. That is, the processes and stages that occur during the acute inflammatory response are always the same in response to different stimuli. Inflammation is an important process in the functioning of the immune system.
In fact, during the acute inflammatory response, the body quickly prepares itself for the created conditions and tries to manage the situation by preparing the conditions.
What happens during the acute inflammatory response?
Acute inflammation at the site of injury is associated with symptoms such as redness, warmth, swelling and pain. But even though none of these symptoms are pleasant for us, why does the body create such a response?
Immediately after injury, blood flow and permeability of capillaries in the damaged tissue increases. This causes plasma and proteins to leave the blood and enter the damaged tissue.
The increase in blood flow causes redness and warmth of the tissue, and the fluid leaving the blood and entering the tissue also causes swelling. The benefit of increasing blood flow and vascular permeability is that white blood cells can better reach the injury site and deal with pathogenic factors that have entered the injury site.
On the other hand, white blood cells need various chemicals that must reach the tissue through the blood to function optimally. So, the body facilitates the entry of white blood cells and their required chemicals into the tissue by creating an acute inflammatory response. But what is the benefit of removing fluids from the bloodstream?
Increasing fluids on the one hand causes the dilution of bacterial toxins in the injury site, and on the other hand, it cleans and empties the injury site of bacteria, viruses, tissue-damaged cells, and damaged blood cells.
In fact, the entry of excess fluid into the tissue acts like a flushing system and cleans the area. This fluid is removed with the help of the lymphatic system.
The interesting point here is that pain in the acute inflammatory response is also part of the body’s defense system. By causing pain, the body actually stops using the injured organ more so that, on the one hand, the amount of cell damage does not increase, and on the other hand, the injured organ is given rest to facilitate its repair.
final word
From the above, we can see that the acute inflammatory response is an intelligent mechanism that the body uses to deal with possible injuries and infections caused by it. As long as the body’s immune system is functioning normally, the acute inflammatory response is in the person’s best interests and is not addressed by doctors. The body of people whose immune system works properly reacts to injuries in a timely and appropriate manner.
If you have any questions about this article, you can ask your question in the comments section so that the site’s team of doctors can answer you.