Gnarled, bumpy, and the color of old paper, ginger root looks more like it belongs in a witch’s cauldron than a doctor’s office, but can ginger help with pain? Ginger has long been used in Chinese medicine as an anti-inflammatory, and new research is indicating that for some people, ginger is an effective tool to help manage pain.
Can ginger help with pain? The research
A study from the University of Georgia built on previous work identifying ginger’s success as an anti-inflammatory in rodents. Patrick O’Connor, a professor in the college of education’s department of kinesiology, led two studies that looked at the effects of raw and heat-treated ginger on muscle pain. Seventy-four study participants ingested either raw or heat-treated ginger over 11 days and then performed moderately taxing exercise of the arms.
The effects were marked: ginger reduced pain in both sets of study participants by 25%, with both heat-treated and raw ginger producing approximately the same results. O’Connor noted that this type of exercise-induced pain is very common across all types of activity. Ginger can help with this type of muscle pain, perhaps by reducing inflammation in the taxed muscle.
But ginger can help with other types of pain, too. Osteoarthritis is the most common type of arthritis, suffered by approximately 20 to 27 million people in the U.S. This wear-and-tear condition affects the large, weight-bearing joints in the body. A study from the University of Miami found that ginger could reduce this type of pain by as much as 40%. In a six-week double-blind, placebo-controlled study, 247 participants received either a highly concentrated extract of two ginger species, Zingiber officinale and Alpinia galangal, or a placebo.
The study’s lead author, Roy Altman, MD, now at the University of California, Los Angeles, believes these results follow earlier the earlier findings linked to rodent research, noting that:
“Research shows that ginger affects certain inflammatory processes at a cellular level.”
Can ginger help with pain because of its anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties?
Most of the studies on the anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties of ginger have been conducted on rodents, but across the board the results have pointed towards strong potential for pain relief in humans. One study found that fresh ginger in particular had good potential anti-oxidant properties that were both protective and healing when it comes to cellular stress.
As far as anti-inflammatory effects, research has shown that different compounds in ginger can help with pain in different ways. One study found that ginger extract can reduce the elevated expression of NFκB and TNF-α in rats with liver cancer. Elevated levels of these two compounds are often linked to inflammatory diseases like cardiovascular disease, allergy, asthma, Crohn’s, diabetes, and arthritis.
Even without substantial human trials and research, it does seem that ginger can help with pain specifically as it relates to inflammation in the body.
There are some key things to remember when supplementing with ginger.
1. Always check with your doctor
Before adding significant amounts of ginger to your diet, talk with your doctor about potential issues, including drug interactions. This can be especially important for those people taking Coumadin (a blood thinner), as ginger can interfere with the effects of that medicine.
2. Choose the correct formulation
After checking