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Arthritis symptoms can make life miserable. After all, the stiff, swollen joints and agonizing pain leave you unable to do a lot of the daily things you once enjoyed. And in spite of all the medical advances we’ve made over the past few decades, we’ve yet to find a good cure for the condition.
Luckily, there are a few things you can do to treat the most painful arthritis symptoms. And while it’s unlikely that any course of treatment will offer you total relief, managing arthritis symptoms can help make the pain more bearable, and more importantly, keep your condition from getting worse. So, what are the most common arthritis symptoms? And how can you treat them?
Common Arthritis Symptoms
The most common symptom of arthritis is joint pain. That’s because arthritis is caused by the gradual erosion of the lining of your joints, called the synovium. There are a lot of reasons this happens, but it can typically be boiled down to two general categories. First, there’s osteoarthritis, which is caused when age or pressure on the joints gradually wears away the synovium. As a result, your bones can no longer move smoothly through the joints, which causes pain. The most common cause of osteoarthritis is simply age but being overweight, injury or even your genes can make you more likely to develop the condition.
Secondly, there is inflammatory arthritis. Typically, inflammatory arthritis is caused by autoimmune disease, which is a condition where the body’s immune system begins to attack its own tissue. As a result, the synovium becomes swollen and inflamed, which leads to fluid build up in the joints and eventually can even result in joint deformities. No one knows what causes autoimmune conditions like inflammatory arthritis, but there may be a genetic component.
Regardless of which type of arthritis you have, the joint pain is frequently accompanied by stiffness in the mornings or after long periods of rest. Along with swelling of the joints, pain and stiffness are the most common arthritis symptoms and the most important symptoms to treat.
How Can You Treat Them?
The first step in treating arthritis is to deal with the pain and inflammation in the joints. NSAIDs are the most commonly prescribed drugs for treating these symptoms. NSAIDS are a class of drugs that contain common, over-the-counter painkillers like aspirin and ibuprofen. NSAIDS, or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, work by blocking the pain receptors in the brain, which dulls the pain of arthritis. But they also target the inflammation in the joints. That fact, along with their low risk of side effects, makes them great for treating arthritis symptoms.
But often, NSAIDS might not be strong enough to effectively treat severe arthritis symptoms. In cases of severe inflammation, your doctor may prescribe corticosteroids. Corticosteroids are a hormone that your body produces naturally in response to inflammation. They help to fight the inflammation and reduce the damage it causes. But synthetic corticosteroids can be prescribed in higher doses to help stimulate this natural response.
Another type of drug commonly prescribed for cases of inflammatory arthritis is disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs, or DMARDs. These work by blocking the inflammation which would slowly destroy your joints over time. This helps to preserve the joints from further damage and limit the pain you experience. Typically, DMARDs suppress the immune system, which means your white blood cells produce fewer antibodies. And fewer antibodies means that there are fewer available to attack your joints, thus limiting the inflammation they can cause.
Most of the time, arthritis symptoms are treated by combining an anti-inflammatory drug with a pain killer. Which types of drugs you are prescribed will depend on the severity of your symptoms. If your arthritis is diagnosed soon enough, you can often start treatment before serious damage is done to your joints.
But in cases of advanced arthritis, when the synovium is almost completely gone, often surgery is the only option. And the most common type of surgical intervention for arthritis is a joint replacement. Basically, joint replacement surgery consists of fashioning an artificial plastic joint to take the place of your eroded synovium. The smooth plastic joint allows your bones to move without rubbing together, which can alleviate the arthritis symptoms.
The best course of action is to see your doctor as soon as you develop significant symptoms of arthritis. They can craft a treatment plan for you. And regular checkups will let you fine tune your treatment plan until you have the best possible method of managing your arthritis worked out.
So, do you have arthritis? How do you deal with your symptoms? What works for you? Tell us in the comments section below.
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