Rheumatoid arthritis is one of the most common of the 200 or more types of arthritis. It affects over a million people in the USA alone and it’s twice as likely to be contracted by ladies than it is by men. All types of arthritis are inflammatory disorders which centre on the joints. Most are caused when the cartilage between the joints breaks down or degrades, the cartilage is a buffer and without it the ends of bones rub together. This rubbing together causes intense discomfort and inflammation which leads to lack of mobility and, if not properly treated, deformity. Rheumatoid arthritis itself is an autoimmune conditions in which the body attacks its own tissues which it starts to view as hostile. This causes the inflammation and discomfort associated with the condition.
There are all sorts of treatments available to arthritic patients and due to how common the disease is a great deal of time and resources are poured into researching it every year. Most rheumatoid arthritis treatments centre around the use of anti-inflammatory drugs, steroids and immune system inhibitors. These all work by reducing swelling in affected areas and lessening the pain while increasing the mobility in those joints. The inhibitors work because the bodies immune response to infection is inflammation, without this response there’d be a lot less swelling in the effected joints.
Doctors have been looking into taking people off these medications when their condition starts to clear and go into remission. For a long time it was thought that lessening, or tapering a persons treatment would just bring the symptoms back harder but it’s now become clear that there’s very little danger of that at all.
Medical professionals never want you to be on any drug for too long, especially if they’re hard hitting and have addictive properties. The fact that they can take patients off of arthritis treatments without adversely affecting their health is great news and means a better standard of wellness of the patients affected.
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