The Insulite System for Healthy Joints  is a detailed, weekly lifestyle support system designed to aid persons with joint pain or OA in improving their health and well being. This balanced approach combines weekly nutritional guidance, exercise plans, specifically formulated nutritional support, knowledge and strategies to neutralize food cravings, and information to transform unproductive behavioral patterns into positive ones.

Food Addiction/Cravings Awareness: The Food Addiction/Craving Awareness aspect of the Insulite System for Healthy Joints, informs our clients about the addictive nature of carbohydrates and sugars on specific brain structures and neurochemical systems (primarily dopamine and serotonin). We help our clients understand how these foods can trigger profound cravings and even addiction.  We replace guilt and will power with a carefully crafted approach in which clients are urged to gradually reduce carbohydrates and especially refined sugars.  This is coupled with a slow increase in exercise in an effort to more effectively balance their neurochemistry and neutralize their cravings.

 
Support Network: Insulite Laboratories provides support through unlimited access by e-mail and telephone to our Consulting and Advisory teams as well as a comprehensive, weekly health protocol update via e-mail. Our Consulting and Advisory team answers phone and e-mail questions about the Insulite System for Healthy Joints and refers customers back to their healthcare practitioners whenever indicated. Members of Insulite Laboratories’ Consulting and Advisory team are available to consult with healthcare practitioners as needed.

• For customers who are using anti-hyperglycemic medications like metformin, Avandia, etc., we suggest careful monitoring of blood sugar when using the Insulite System for Healthy Joints.  Both the Insulite supplements and the dietary and exercise guidelines effectively lower blood sugar and improve insulin sensitivity, therefore it is possible that the customer will require a lower dosage or elimination of their anti-hyperglycemic medication.  We always refer our customers back to their prescribing health practitioners to make changes to their medication regimen. 
• Customers are advised to follow their physician guidelines for anti-inflammatory drugs or analgesics.  While it is often the case the people on arthritis self-management programs are able to lower their use of such drugs, these types of changes to medication usage are to be done in collaboration with the physician.
• The Insulite System for Healthy Joints is not designed for people with rheumatoid arthritis or any other form of arthritis.  It is for people who struggle with ordinary joint pain or with osteoarthritis.  Therefore, we cannot comment on any kind of medication dealing with other forms of arthritis.
• There is a great deal of published research on drugs that cause nutrient depletion.  Many doctors believe that nutrients depleted by drugs must be replaced by supplementation.  For more information, please see: LaValle, J, et al. Drug-Induced Nutrient Depletion Handbook.

A Final Note

Health information resources (books, websites, videos, audio, etc) are often presented from the perspective of doctor, nurse, health professional, or scientist.  The aim is to help the consumer understand the biomedical nature of their condition so that he or she better comprehends the need to take some kind of action.  This would be the “disease” approach and is presented from the standpoint of the health professional.

While well-intentioned and helpful, this kind of approach often neglects to include the human experience of living with an illness on a day-to-day basis.  The word “illness” is often used to refer to the experience and effect of the symptoms on the person’s life and social function.

So, the doctor wants to know about the biology of the disease and how the symptoms relate to the underlying disease process.  He or she often tells the story from this viewpoint.  The person with painful joints or a condition like osteoarthritis wants to understand how to recover from her illness, take control, and live more fully each day.  He or she is looking for an explanation and strategy that shares this viewpoint.

Throughout our program, we do our best to provide both viewpoints—the disease vs. illness viewpoint.  You may even consider it a merging of the two viewpoints.  We think it is important that you understand the biology of your condition. But we also want to show how our program may help improve your quality of life.  In our experience, programs are more successful this way.

For example, we may tell you that dietary sugars react with joint cartilage to cause brittleness and damage over time. It is a process called glycation. This is the biology, the disease process.  It is important to know this so you take the dietary reduction of sugar to be as serious as it truly is.  On the other hand, we would also tell you  that limiting dietary sugars might improve your ability to climb stairs, walk longer distances, improve the comfort in your hands, and keep you active longer as part of healthy aging.

We may tell you that every extra one pound of body weight increases the mechanical load (force) on the knee joint by 4 times.  That’s the biology.  But we would also tell you that loss of only ten pounds of weight can dramatically improve your quality of life, and your ability to become more and more active.  It might allow you to reduce your use of pain medication.  It may free you to be more socially active and, in turn, raise your mood to a higher level.

On a final note, you will occasionally see a certain idea or scientific study discussed under more than one side heading.  This is done because there may be a certain degree of overlap.  For example, we may discuss how elevated blood sugar contributes to joint disease under three separate headings, such as Diabetes, Metabolic Syndrome, or Insulin Resistance.  Of course, these three conditions are all related. We want to make sure that if you click on just one of these, you don’t miss a key point.  However, if you were to read all three, you might see an idea appear more than once.  Please bear with us.  We want to make sure our readers gain the full benefit of the information contained in our site and in our program.