The spleen is an organ found in all vertebrates. Similar in structure to a large lymph node. It plays important roles in regard to red blood cells and the immune system. It removes old red blood cells and holds a reserve of blood, which can be valuable in case of hemorrhagic shock, and also recycles iron. As a part of the mononuclear phagocyte system, it metabolizes hemoglobin removed from senescent red blood cells (erythrocytes). The globin portion of hemoglobin is degraded to its constitutive amino acids, and the heme portion is metabolized to bilirubin, which is removed in the liver. I’m going to list the 10 amazing ways to keep your spleen healthy
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The spleen synthesizes antibodies in its white pulp and removes antibody-coated bacteria and antibody-coated blood cells by way of blood and lymph node circulation. These monocytes, upon moving to injured tissue, turn into dendritic cells and macrophages while promoting tissue healing. The spleen is a center of activity of the mononuclear phagocyte system and is analogous to a large lymph node, as its absence causes a predisposition to certain infections.
The 10 Amazing Ways to Keep Your Spleen Healthy
1. Diet
A healthy diet low in carbs, sugars, processed foods and refined grains is important. If you want to stay healthy, leaving your calories low to avoid fat gain helps as well. The more you eat a healthy diet, the more you can sustain good health, even if it takes some discipline. Moderate quantities of cereals and pulses sustain good spleen function. Rice, wheat, quinoa, millet, buckwheat, lentils, dried beans, chickpeas and peas of all kinds should be eaten everyday. They can be accompanied by generous portions of vegetables, and sensible portions of meat or fish.
2. Fasting
The spleen, like other organs can benefit from fasting. This includes intermittent and periodic prolonged fasting. You gain the benefits of autophagy, where you body cleans up damaged protein. Growth hormone production is also increased, where you gain the ability to help you body rejuvenate and stay younger and stronger. Just be sure to eat at regular intervals — being sure to get all of your micro and macro nutrients in. This will ensure that you’re not literally starving your body.
The 10 Amazing Ways to Keep Your Spleen Healthy
3. Supplements
There are plenty of healthy supplements on the market that can help with your spleen and other aspects of your body. All this means is that you should get most of your nutrients from your diet, but if you can’t, taking a supplement is always a nice addition. Getting all of your vitamins and minerals in is important, including Vitamins A-K, iron, calcium, potassium, magnesium, manganese, and selenium. This will make a difference in your overall health, which can make your spleen cleaner. As long as you have the right balance of nutrients in your body, you should be fine. To further help, you can take some branded supplements that can give you additional help, along with herbal encapsulated supplements that can make a difference.
4. Exercise
Exercise, especially cardiovascular exercise, is great for the body in too many ways to count. It helps you lose weight and keeps your arteries working with your blood flowing. The human spleen shows a decrease in volume of around 40% early during vigorous exercise and in response to other stressful stimuli such as maximal apnoea and the breathing of hypoxic gas mixtures. Contraction seems an active response, mediated by alpha-adrenergic fibres in the splenic nerve. If you’re struggling with a problem that includes a enlarged spleen, this will obviously work for you. As long as you’re getting in 150 minutes of cardio a week, you should be good.
The 10 Amazing Ways to Keep Your Spleen Healthy
5. Checkup
Be sure to check with a doctor if you sense any problems with your body. The spleen is hard to detect, and this is why you should get blood work done, along with a checkup at least once a year. When you see your doctor, ask them questions and inquire on things you’ve noticed. This will be sure to fix the problem or prevent it from happening in the first place. Also be sure to let them know what you know, because a doctor may not know everything about the issue that you’re dealing with. If you’ve done your research, ask your doctor if another option is possible. You can rule out splenomegaly and diabetes, and try to prevent a splenectomy.
6. Weight
Having a stable and healthy weight is important if you want to maintain health year around and for the long-term. If you’re constantly fluctuating in weight, it can put a lot of strain on your body. It’s important to stay a healthy weight, where you’re not too skinny or fat, too. If you follow this, you’ll find that your body can properly maintain homeostasis better, even if it takes a little bit of work. Obesity results in the inability of the spleen to synthesize cytokines, including IL-10, and proinflammatory cytokines in obesity are then likely to emerge from tissues other than the spleen because serum levels of IL-10, but not proinflammatory cytokines, decreased despite the expression of these cytokines.
The 10 Amazing Ways to Keep Your Spleen Healthy
7. Protection
Be sure not to allow anyone to kick you in the spleen! And yes, be aware that you can feel your spleen, but it’s hard to kick right in that spot. Yeah, to some degree though, you can feel it if you don’t treat your body well or get punched in the right spot. It’s also fun to know that all organs in your abdominal cavity have nerves, except for your liver. It’s not to say that it can’t happen, but it’s good to avoid physical damage of any body part, including the organs. Be sure to wear protection for chemicals or physical activities, because it can reach your spleen. While it may seem obvious, it’s still a worthy mention (to be risk averse) that some people can somehow overlook.
8. Stress
Having stress in your life is never good, and it can even help cause things like cancer. Be it physical strain or mental stress, you want to avoid this at all costs. While it may be hard, it’s not quite as difficult as you think. Most of us obligate ourselves to feel stressed, be it work, overthinking, or grief. It’s typically not worth it, and we can always make a change in things that at least seem beyond our control. Just be aware that stress appears to prompt the release of stem cells from the bone marrow to the spleen, where they develop into white blood cells, or monocytes, and expand over time. Then the spleen becomes a reservoir of inflammatory cells.
The 10 Amazing Ways to Keep Your Spleen Healthy
9. Drugs
Be it hard drugs for recreation or the ones prescribed by a doctor, they can all hurt your body. The funny thing is that the doctors give you some of these hard drugs for medical use. A sad fact is that many people self-medicate by taking hard drugs off the street without knowing or caring about the side-effects. There are too many commercials with drugs and their endless side effects that can include death. Drugs may provoke the enlargement of the spleen by direct effect on splenic cells or as a side effect of disturbances in other organs, such as the liver, or systems, such as the haematoimmunological system. Some drugs provoke severe haemolysis associated with splenomegaly
10. Sickness
While something like surgery is always an option to “get better,” it’s not the optimal solution that should be listed here. Since you’re trying to avoid this along with death, prevention (which we all need) or to fix a problem, it’s best to keep your spleen. If you’re without your spleen, you’re at an increased risk of becoming sick, considering it helps produce your immune cells. You should try to avoid this with or without a spleen. This is because the more you gain inflammation and become sick (common cold or flu), the more at risk you are for an enlarged spleen. If you’ve got a preexisting condition, this can further complicate things. This is why it’s always important to avoid things that can feed sickness such as sugar and stress.
Final Thoughts: The 10 Amazing Ways to Keep Your Spleen Healthy
These are the easy ways to keep your spleen clean, so be sure to stay on top of it, spleeners!