Pain can be debilitating from inflammation, but isn’t it supposed to be necessary to heal the body?
In: Biology
The increased redness at a wound means more blood is flowing to the area. More blood means more white blood cells to fight off an infection. It also means repair of the wound may be ongoing.
Its bad when it interferes with the body’s normal function. Inflammation also causes swelling. If the swelling presses on a nerve, it causes numbness. If the swelling presses on blood vessels it can cut off blood flow to an affected area. Swelling at joints may cause more friction which then causes more swelling.
Hmmm.. the answer is not so simple. You could argue that inflammation is always bad as it represents the bodies response to a pathological process or extrinsic insult.
I think what others in the comments are getting at is that longstanding or high grade acute inflammation can have consequences which go beyond the response to the particular insult.
Think of it like this, your house (body ) is on fire, your sprinklers go off (immune system) but for some reason the fire just won’t go out. Maybe the fire gets bigger, maybe it stays the same or maybe it gets a little smaller but if the sprinklers keep going off because of the fire, eventually your house will get flooded.
The general rule for whether or not your body’s reaction to something is “bad” is “Does it interfere with something”. Something that’s really inflamed but doesn’t interfere with anything (and is not caused by something critical) may be left alone, but if light inflammation is say, making it difficult to breath, that’s gotta be treated.
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