After a peaceful sleep, when you get up you may feel a bit stiff. If you are sitting in a computer table for a long time, or you are doing gardening work for sometime and when you get up you may feel a bit stiff. Sometimes, when you sneeze, you feel an occasional discomfort all over the body. These are all mild occasional pains, whereas arthritis goes beyond this pain.
Arthritis information shows that it includes a number of diseases that leads to inflammation, pain and stiffness, primarily in the joints and the connecting tissues. The supporting structures for the joints are called connecting tissues. Examples are the muscles, cartilage, ligaments and tendons. About arthritis, there are more than six kinds mostly it is chronic, but some like the gout or intermittent. With the actual joint inflammation it causes swelling and warmth, whereas in cartilage lining, the joint wears out but the inflammation is minor.
Before knowing some arthritis information, you should know what is a joint and what are the activities done by tendon, ligament and cartilage. The ends of the bones meet at a joint. Cartilage is a layer of smooth pliable tissue. Tendons connect muscles to bones. Ligaments connect and support bones to keep them in proper alignment. The joints work like a machine and the synovial fluid produced by the inner lining helps in lubricating and provides nutrients.
When you are injured or infected, the body reacts in a natural way like swelling, pain, warmth and redness. Inflammation is not only the result of injury. Sometimes, it perpetuates injury and continues for a very long time. Then, it becomes a severe arthritis and it spreads to the other parts of the body.
Stiffness, rigidity, tissue damage, and pain are the symptoms of arthritis and it occurs, when the joint is moved. As the mobility decreases, the muscles around the bone weaken, the cartilage breaks down and the bones go a little out of shape. There are more than 100 kinds of arthritis and it differs from individual to individual.
Limited joint function or increase pain in movement, fatigue and loss of appetite are other symptoms. The signs about arthritis are joint swelling, joint redness, joint warmth deformity and loss of joint motion.
Once you feel a terrible pain, you must consult a health care professional, who may ask you to undergo a thorough checkup and many tests, like the blood test, urine test etc. In severe cases, you may be asked to take X-rays and imaging procedures like the CT (Computed Tomography) or MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging).
If there is only ligament, tissue or the tendon swells the pain will be in the joint. Muscle strain adds more pain, and if there is a joint damage, then the normal activities like getting out of bed, or holding a pencil also become very painful.
You should also be aware of this arthritis information also. The level of pain and discomfort varies from person to person. Emotional stress and distress can intensify sensation of pain. There are many ways to treat this disease. They are homeopathy, vitamins and fish oils, herbal remedies, Acupuncture, Acupressure, Magnet Therapy, Diet Therapy, self control and massage etc.
Valuable arthritis information is surgery is not a must, but people in the sixties do go for hip replacement surgery or knee replacement surgery.
