RA Flares Getting Worse? It’s Probably What You’re Eating

Introduction to RA Diet Triggers 0:00

Hello, rheumatoid arthritis warrior. If you are watching this video, you might be having this pain, stiffness, leading to rheummatoide arthritis flare. And you may be wondering, what did I eat yesterday causing this flare? And, You might feeling guilty about it. In the video today, I'll help you get rid of that guilt. I will help to you learn about what are the foods that can trigger rheuimatoids arthritis flair and what other foods you can add to calm down the flare of rheuma arthritis. Please stick around.

Hello Rheumatoid Arthritis Warrior, this is Dr. Anand Subedi, your rheumator arthritis coach at The Room Doc, as well as a practicing rheumeatologist here in Kerala. Today, I will help you learn about what are the triggering foot for rheuma arthritis and what you can do to minimize those triggers. Before I go deeper, please accept my gift, the free copy of the Holistic Rheumatoid Arthritis Guidebook, as well as a free recipe for a smoothie to fight against rheumatitis. And this year, our team has a big mission to fulfill, and that is to reach at least 100,000 rheumatoid arthritis warrior like you.

So please support our mission by liking our videos, sharing the videos with those who are suffering with rheuma arthritis. And this information will help them fight against rheoma arthritis, so please, support out mission. Now let me go into the topic, what we are talking today is what is the role of nutrition, the food that you eat in causing rheumatoid arthritis flair. So we'll be talking about what are the foods that contribute to rheuma arthritis flare and we will learn about the details. And I have worked hard and I've done a detailed research of the current available literature to understand what are the foods that are good for RA flair and what aren't.

And this nutrition follows our NESCAR framework, the N-E-S-C-A-R framework on fighting against rheumatoid arthritis.

Sugar-Sweetened Beverages and Inflammation 2:00

But today we'll focus on the nutritional component of our NASCAR. now let's start with the topic of what are the things you need to avoid for rheumatoid arthritis flares and the number one in the list is sugar sweetened beverages and i call that SSB all of those sugar sweetened beverages and the common example that you can see everywhere are those sodas. Now they come in different forms like you might be getting different form of sodás in your partner world but they are universal. And the main problem that happens with this sugar sweeten beverages is they have a lot of added sugar.

Many of them also have high fructose corn syrup and some of the also high content of sucrose. So all of this carbohydrate what they do is they increase your blood sugar and you might have heard this term called sugar spike. All of these are known to cause sugar spikes and when your body has high sugar what your does it makes some excessive amount of insulin. So your body is trying to use this excess sugar, that's why your bodies make extra insulin. And over time, because of this excessive insulin, you start developing insulin resistance.

When you have insulin resistant, what it eventually cause in some of you, it might even cause diabetes. But even before diabetes, What it can also cause is a chronic inflammation. Now if you recall, rheumatoid arthritis is also a Chronic inflammation in your joints. Insulin resistance over time lead us to have this unexplained, uncontrolled, chronic inflammation leading to rheumatoid arthritis. Other thing that can also happen with this component is they can increase your weight. And when you have excessive weight, you will have excess fat tissues.

Fat tissues are known to produce inflammatory chemicals, we call cytokines or adipokine. Those are active chemicals which are known to increase inflammation. So these sugar sweetened beverages, what they do, they cause insulin spike, increase blood sugar and indirectly leads to chronic inflammation and that's how it can increase the risk of rheumatoid arthritis. And when you are having a flare, it also can worsen your flare symptoms. If you could recall, The flare is when your symptoms are worse than usual.

And the reason that happens is because of increased inflammation and taking this sugar sweetened beverages such as sodas or fruit juice, they can further increase inflammation, causing more pain and more inflammation. So one of the most important trigger that we need to avoid is this suger sweeten beverages, such sods and even the fruit juices. because they have high amount of added sugar, high amounts of high fructose corn syrup, and then high number of sucrose which are not good for our health.

Now the second category of food that you need to avoid for rheumatoid arthritis and rheuma arthritis include this ultra processed foods and they are also universal and that includes this packaged snacks which are easy to eat easy, to find but they're not good for your rheumatoid arthritis and other include this processed meats such as bacon such, as sausages those are not very good food for you overall health and then also include ready-made meals and sugary products All of these are ultra processed foods that are not good for rheumatoid arthritis flares.

And you might wonder why they are no good? Now here is the problem. These foods have high saturated fat. They also have a high trans fat which is a not so good form of fats. They also have high sodium.

Ultra-Processed Foods to Avoid 6:00

They have very low fiber and they have low micronutrients. All of these contain like the saturated fat, the trans fat the sodium and emulsifier are inflammatory. they increase the degree of inflammation in your body. Hence they are not very good for rheumatoid arthritis flares. Now these they can also indirectly increase inflammation by increasing your risk of obesity. component, they increase your risk of obesity. And because of the obesity, as we discussed earlier, that can also increase the inflammation in your body.

So when you have rheumatoid arthritis and when your having flair, taking these ultra processed foods further increases the inflammatory in the body, increasing your symptoms of rheuomatoids flares. Now they also indirectly increase inflammation like we discussed earlier. They can directly cause an inflammatory state in your body. So all this ultra processed food containing this high amount of saturated fat, trans fat sodium and emulsifier also increase in inflammation in the body which typically happen in RA.

And just imagine if your bodies already inflamed with RA adding this food put extra fuel into the fire. causing more inflammation and more pain. Now the third category of food that you need to avoid are these high intake of red meat and processed meat. There are two main reasons why you should avoid high intakes of Red Meat and Processed Meat. 1. high saturated fatty acids and other one are those chemicals we call them advanced glycosylation end products or AEGs. Now these are the two main ingredients that are not very good for rheumatoid arthritis.

The high-saturated fatty acid what they do they increase your weight. So increased weight gain is one of the major problem of consuming too much of red meat and processed meat. And other one, they also directly increase inflammation, particularly because of this high content of nitrates and the nitrites, which are typically found in this processed and then the red. Now, the other important one is not every meat is made equal. Sometimes how you prepare your meat, is so important. particularly if you prepare your meat on high heat cooking like grilling or roasting a deep-fried they are much more inflammatory than when you cook with other different ways hence it's important to understand how you cooked your meet is very important.

If you do this overheating like grilling roasting or deep frying that can further increase the problem when we take those red meat and if we consume this red meet and highly processed meat they can also increase inflammation in your body As we discussed, RA is a highly inflammatory disease and adding this excess red meat and processed meat further increases inflammation in your body, increasing your symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis flair. So think of the same thing, if you eat those foods, you are adding more fuel into the fire, that will further increase inflammation to your bodies,

Red and Processed Meat Concerns 9:00

causing more pain from rheuma to arthritis. Now let me summarize what we talked so far. We talked about three categories of food that we need to avoid. The number one, sugar sweetened beverages and that includes all of those soda that are so easily available. And then those are those fruit juices that also have high level of added sugar, high-level of corn syrup, High-Level of fructose and high levels of sucrose. and all these three components increase your blood sugar and increase insulin resistance causing chronic inflammation.

The second category we talk about are those processed meats and red meat which are known to increase risk of overweight and obesity and also they contain AEG the advanced glycation end product which is itself inflammatory and the Third category, we talk about those ultra processed food that has high amount of trans fat, which is not a good fat. And they also increase your risk of weight gain, increasing your risks of rheumatoid arthritis and increasing the symptoms of Rheumatitis Flair. So we talked about avoiding those three important foods.

Now so far we have talked about what are the food to avoid. Now let me also touch on another important topic some of the controversies in rheumatoid arthritis flare and then what other food that we need to see a lot of information and many of them are controversial. Many of these are based on anecdotal experience without any scientific data. But today I'm debunking those controversies and all of this is based upon some of the published literature. food and this disease is very hard so we may not get good data but the available data give us some guidance on what are those foods that are good and some of the food that may or may be not be good for rheumatoid arthritis.

Plant-Based vs Animal-Based Diets 11:00

So let me go over those controversial topics or controversial foods whether they are for you or not with rheuma arthritis and rheoma arthritis flares. the number one being the question of is it good to be plant-based or animal- based diet? And the answer is, it depends. So the type and the quality of food is important. What is the the food you are eating? Either it could be animal based or it would be a plant based. The current guideline suggests a Plant predominant. The current literature supports using more of a plant predominate food that is better for rheumatoid arthritis.

But that does not mean that you need to absolutely avoid animal based food because there are few animal-based foods that are also very helpful. They are known to decrease inflammation such as the fatty fish, which are know to increase inflammation, the lean meat that prepared without any additives and which is cooked the better way, not deep-fried. Those are also good form of lean protein for example chicken. So chicken could be a good source of Lean protein which can help maintain good protein intake in your body So the important thing is it depends what type of plant-based food you are eating What about animal based food?

You are Eating so it Depends on the quality and the type Of the food. You're consuming it not just one versus the other other so we should not have to fight between one versus the other and always moderation is very important so you need to be moderate on how much plant-based food you consume and how most animal- based food. Now the next important and controversial topic is the role of gluten in rheumatoid arthritis flare. And I'm sure when you search the internet, you will hear a lot of stories of people telling you, oh, I went gluten free and my array was gone.

But that may be too much oversimplification that is just based on their own experience. And that maybe based their personal experiences, but the data is different.

Gluten and Rheumatoid Arthritis 13:00

Now when I look little more further into the data on what is the role of gluten and I found a very interesting study that was done in 2001 and this study what they did was they divided people with rheumatoid arthritis into two groups. The group one they went on vegan and gluten free diet and they included around 38 patients. which is a small number of patients for such type of studies. In group number two, they put those patients into a well-balanced diet which included gluten. So one group was vegan with gluten free and the next group well balanced diet group and there was 28 patients on that group.

And when we compare the outcome on how they did with rheumatoid arthritis and they call that rheuma arthritis control or not. So, after one year, almost 40% of people who were on the vegan gluten-free diet had well-controlled rheumatoid arthritis. And around 4% had RTA, which is suggesting that gluten free diet was significantly associated with better rheuma arthritis control. But there are some questions we should ask about this study. The number one being the number of patients enrolled in those studies.

So this is a very small study, we need to have a much bigger study to replicate this finding. But this studies encouraging that in some patients gluten free might help you control your rheumatoid arthritis better. And that also include minimizing your Rheumataid Arthritis flares. but it may not be universally applied to all of the patients who have rheumatoid arthritis. encouraging that it has some role in decreasing your risk of gluten so it does an important role and decreasing the risk up rheumatoid arthritis flares.

Now what I typically recommend my patient based on this data and few other data is to try going gluten-free for up to 6 to 12 weeks and see how you feel. If you are feeling significantly better then it might be worth continuing long-term So in that case, it might be worth continuing gluten free diet long term. But if you are not feeling better by 6 to 12 weeks, you may not need to go gluten-free. And all the thing I also do is for some of my patients who have RA and who comes to me with symptoms of GI symptoms such as bloating, diarrhea, unexplained weight loss, if they have any symptoms, then I do sometimes do check for gluten sensitivity.

by doing some blood tests. And if they are positive, that will lead us to the diagnosis of celiac disease. For those patients, it's important to avoid gluten, but for those who do not have those antibodies to gluten it may not be important for you to have gluten. But there's a caveat. There is a condition what we call non-celiac gluten sensitivity. And what does that mean? That means if you eat gluten, you might get some stomach upset like bloating, diarrhea or you may be having unexplained weight loss.

Dairy Products and RA Flares 16:00

Even though your blood test could be negative, You might have non celiac glutensensitivity. If you have that problem, it might be advisable to avoid gluten because you are having those unusual symptoms when you take gluten. And in those cases, it might also help your rheumatoid arthritis symptoms. But you don't have to be absolutely go gluten free if you do not have any gastrointestinal symptoms and when you try 6 to 12 months of coming off of gluten and you are not feeling any difference with your Rheumataid Arthritis activity, you may not need to do gluten-free diet.

Hello Rheumatoid Arthritis Warrior, I hope you are learning about the diet and rheumatic arthritis and flares. I Hope you're learning new things here. If you like the video that we are producing here, please like and subscribe. Please share this video with other rheuma arthritis warriors who can benefit from this information. And as I discussed earlier, we have a big mission for 2026. Our goal is to reach up to 100,000 RA warriors who are suffering with rheumatoid arthritis. And you can support us by liking and subscribing these videos and sharing with other rheuma arthritis warrior who have similar problem like yours.

So please help us to raise that big goal. Now getting back to our topic. The 3rd controversial topic is the role of dairy products in rheumatoid arthritis and flares. Now with the same you will hear so many different stories of people who have gone completely dairy free and they have done well with rheuatoide arthritis but other people may not feel a major difference in their RA activity. So there's a lot of variation. So let me set some light on what we know so far. Now, within the dairy product, there are so many different things like cheese, yogurt, and milk.

The type of dairy products that you consume is important. For example, if you consumed fermented dairy, They are known to be mildly anti-inflammatory and they also improve your GI symptoms. So if you have RA, it might be a good idea to add some fermented food in your daily routine food intake. Now the other one is low fat containing dairy products. The current data suggests if you eat low-fat dairy product it may not have any major role either increasing your risk of RA flare versus decreasing the risk RA flair so there is no no major benefit or risk with the low fat dairy products and some studies do suggest that they might be mildly anti-inflammatory.

So for that reason, I do recommend some of my patients to go dairy free for a couple of weeks and see how you feel. If you the dairy tend to aggravate your symptoms, it might be worth decreasing the daily product. But if you don't feel any difference, you may not need to. Go dairy-free if we have rheumatoid arthritis. now in particular if you drink a lot of high fat dairy products and at high volume it might cause weight gain which can cause increased inflammation due

Closing Summary and Call to Action 19:00

to extra weight so just be careful of what type of dairy product you are consuming so try to minimize the high fad dairy and high-volume which obesity risk and it can increase your risk of inflammation and rheumatoid arthritis symptoms. So the key here is the type of dairy prerogative porn. If you do the fermented dairy, it might be mildly anti-inflammatory. if you consume low fat, It may be neutral. It might not affect your rheuma arthritis activity. But if do high fat dairy content or high volume,it can increases your weight and that can increased your risks of rheoma arthritis flares.

Hello rheumatoid arthritis warrior. Thank you so much for watching this video. So in our next video, we'll talk more about other controversial topics on food and rheuma to arthritis flares. If you like this, video please like and subscribe. Please share this with other rheumi to Arthritis warrior and I'll see you in the next. Bye bye.