Help Keep Inflammation in Check

Inflammation is not necessarily harmful. In truth, your body uses the inflammatory response to protect itself from infection and to speed up healing. Acute inflammation of this type is a natural reaction to an injury or infection. Chronic inflammation, on the other hand, is linked to a variety of disorders, including heart disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and inflammatory bowel disease.

Many different antioxidants have been proven to prevent chronic inflammation in cruciferous vegetables such as cabbage. In fact, studies have found that consuming more cruciferous vegetables lowers some inflammatory blood indicators. One research of over 1,000 Chinese women found that those who ate the most cruciferous vegetables had much lower levels of inflammation than those who ate the least. Sulforaphane, kaempferol, and other antioxidants present in this extraordinary group of plants are most likely responsible for their anti-inflammatory properties.