Arthritis: symptoms, causes, and treatment

Arthritis: symptoms, causes, and treatment Arthritis is an inflammation of the joints of the body and may occur in one or more joints.

The most common areas affected by arthritis are the knees, hands, and parts of the back. Arthritis causes difficulty in movement and hinders the person from practicing his daily activities comfortably. The inflammation may be very severe, making it difficult to move completely, and the patient feels severe chronic pain. Arthritis is one of the common diseases that affect everyone, whether young or old. As arthritis is not related to a specific age, it may affect humans in childhood or youth, but it is more common in old age. It is a chronic disease due to the difficulty of treating it, as the treatment of arthritis may take long periods until it is completely cured.

There are several types of joint diseases, including rheumatoid arthritis, rheumatism arthritis, bacterial arthritis, gout arthritis, SLE arthritis, and arthritis caused by osteoarthritis.

Causes of arthritis

There are many reasons and factors that make a person develop arthritis, namely:

Aging: 

Those who develop arthritis develop it after the age of forty because the bones become less rigid and more fragile as a result of a lack of calcium, vitamins, and minerals in the body, which directly affects the joints. Therefore, you must take precautions and take the necessary vitamins after the age of forty to maintain calcium and vitamins in the body.

Heredity: 

Heredity plays a big role in a person's arthritis, as people with a family history are more likely than others to develop this disease. People with a family history can also develop arthritis at a young age.

Gender: 

Women get arthritis more than men, especially after the end of the menstrual cycle when women are exposed to a change in hormones. In addition, pregnancy and lactation greatly affect calcium and vitamins in a woman's body, which causes her arthritis.

Overweight: 

Excess weight also causes pressure on bones and joints, causing arthritis. And also by exposing the joints to severe pressure, such as by practicing violent sports, standing for long periods of time, or carrying heavy objects.

Symptoms of arthritis

Patients experience chronic fatigue and high temperatures, particularly in women over the age of 40. Also, the inability to move well and feeling severe pain in the joints when moving or standing for long periods are common, and when the condition progresses, the patient feels very severe pain in the joints even while sitting without making any effort. 

You also feel severe pain in the joint during periods of changing seasons and weather changes, and joint pain usually increases in the winter as cold weather causes inflexibility in the joints and increases their swelling. You also feel severe pain in the area around the joint, and the redness of this area is uneven; the more inflammation in the joint, the more redness appears in the area around it. The patient also felt severe pain and stiffness in the swollen joint when waking up in the morning, and this stiffness was reduced after movement.

Some types of arthritis cause a rash, but this is not very common. Finally, the patient is exposed to joint swelling and redness, especially when practicing violent activities with the hands or feet, such as opening the lid of a tightly closed bottle, carrying heavy objects, or standing for a long time on foot.

Arthritis Treatment

Arthritis is treated by taking drugs and medical preparations that help reduce the condition and its swelling, and this type of drug is not taken except under the supervision of a doctor in order to determine the patient's condition and the necessary dose for it. The treatment is also done by painting the joints with ointments that help relieve pain, and bones and joints can be painted with camphor oil, which contains natural painkillers that relieve joint pain and reduce swelling. 

The patient should also lose weight if she suffers from obesity and does simple exercises that help strengthen the muscles and reduce their swelling. The patient can also use cold and hot water compresses, as cold water helps reduce joint swelling and warm water helps relax muscles and joints and thus relieve pain.