CARDINAL SIGNS OF EGUSI’S INFLAMMATION

The Nigerian egusi soup is a popular soup in the part of the country where I reside. As I had a delicious meal of pounded yam with the said soup this afternoon, I could help but apply the ‘rules’ of inflammation learnt in histopathology class earlier in the day.

There are five (5) cardinal signs of inflammation:

1 1. CALOR i.e. heat

2 2. RUBOR i.e. redness

3 3. TUMOR i.e. swelling

4 4. DOLOR i.e. pain

5 5. FUNCTIO LAESA i.e. loss of function

However, when egusi undergoes inflammation it goes from calor→tumor→rubor.

This is achieved on cooking of this food substance, which is prepared with melon seeds.

HOW? Is the big question…here’s how:

Cooking is the application of heat to food to make it safe to eat as well as appetizing. On application of heat (CALOR) to ground melon seeds, it swells (TUMOR), and finally, when oil is added to at a time relative to the cook and the process of the cooking, it gets kind of reddened (RUBOR).

What about dolor and loss of function?

Fine, I’m aware that inflammation takes place in ONLY living and vascularized tissues. On retrospective thought, maybe that’s why egusi doesn’t undergo dolor and loss of function. After all, only a living tissue can feel pain. And only an individual with a functional organ system can feel the absence of such!
Moral lesson... well, maybe both the food substance in question and cells act in defence of the body, in relation to inflammation.

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