Causes, symptoms and treatment of osteoarthritis

Osteoarthritis is a progressive joint disease in which slow destruction of your cartilage occurs. If it is not treated, the mobility in the joint ultimately deteriorates strongly and the person is deactivated. The article takes into account information about what arthrosis, its symptoms and treatment, characteristic signs and causes of the appearance are.

What you need to know about this disease

Arthrosis

The undeniable destruction of the joint and cartilage is the most common joint on the entire planet. Statistical data are astonishing: four out of five people around the world suffer from the lesion of the common tissue and all consequences of such a pathological process in one or the other.

The disease is just as common in men and women. For a long time it was assumed that osteoarthritis was a joint disease in older people. However, people under 30 years have recently affected the joints.

Such arthrosis is very dangerous because it can quickly lead to the development of immobility with one person. Unfortunately, the number of degenerative shared changes increases annually.

What is the difference between osteoarthritis and arthritis? In arthritis, inflammation of the intra -articular tissue occurs. In the case of osteoarthritis, however, a person suffers from a progressive deformation of the musculoskeletal system.

Why does it arise

The main cause of osteoarthritis is a violation of the metabolism in the joint. For this reason, the cartilage gradually loses elasticity. The causes of this disease of the joints are:

  • pronounced diseases of the metabolic process;
  • Hormonal weight;
  • Acceptance of the blood volume that feeds the joint;
  • Rheumatoid arthritis;
  • Psoriasis;
  • Increased physical activity in the joints (including athletes), which you start to collapse, and this happens at a relatively early age.

The occurrence of osteoarthritis and further progress can influence such factors.

  • Injuries (the more injuries and the stronger they were, the degree of the development of pathology higher);
  • Increased body weight (it leads to excessive stress on the joint and as a result even a faster development of the disease);
  • purulent arthritis;
  • Age (the disease occurs much more frequently in older patients);
  • bad quality, unbalanced nutrition;
  • Frequent hypothermia;
  • Infection infection into the joint;
  • some autoimmunpathologies;
  • General poisoning of the body, including alcohol and nicotine;
  • Specific infectious diseases - such as syphilis, gonorrhea, tuberculosis;
  • some pathological states of the thyroid gland;
  • Hemophilia;
  • Pertes syndrome.

Characteristic features

The most obvious and most characteristic sign of osteoarthritis is pain. It follows whether the organ affected is alone and reinforces whether it is exposed to intensive loads. We learn everything about osteoarthritis, more about these sign groups, since in some cases you are the first to register the development of bone lesions and cartilage.

pain

When the joint gets sick, this is the first sign of his defeat. Unpleasant sensations are intensified when a person makes sharp movements. Localization of pain symptoms of osteoarthritis - only in the place where the pain is. In some cases, however, it can also apply to other sections of the musculoskeletal system that are not influenced by the pathological process.

It is characteristic that a person has almost no pain at night. When he finds the optimal position of the body, he falls asleep. You will be activated near the morning, which forces a person to wake up. In the last phases of the pathology, the pain becomes so serious that he deprives a person of peace.

Crystal in the joints

This is a characteristic symptom of the degenerative lesion: Due to the fact that the elasticity of the organs is reduced, the bones begin to rub against each other, which is accompanied by a characteristic sound. Sometimes it can hear it from a distance.

The sound will be the lighter the more active this disease progresses. And in any case, it will differ significantly from the crackling.

Restriction of mobility

In the initial phase of the development of the pathology, the volume of active movements remains. However, when arthrosis progresses, the bone formations begin to a cartilage tissue, which is why muscle spasm occurs. Active movements from this are violated because the mobility of the joint is ensured by a sufficiently developed cartilage.

A decrease in the activity of movements also results from the fact that the body cannot be finished with conventional loads. Therefore, the movement in the last phases of the development of this pathology is almost impossible.

deformation

This symptom occurs from the fact that growth on the surfaces of the bone occurs. Due to constant irritation, the production of synovial fluid is activated, which is why the organ swells.

Important! Deformation is one of the late symptoms of osteoarthritis. The joint is already affected to a large extent by the disease, and conservative treatment often does not provide any results.

Disease stages

The causes of osteoarthritis

Overall, doctors differentiate between four stages (degrees) arthrosis when classifying the severity of the disease.

  1. At 1 degree, osteophytes are not determined in the diagnosis. There is a certain narrowing of the common gap.
  2. With damage to the connection of the 2nd degree, the gap is slightly narrowed and the osteophytes have already managed to hit the surface of the bone. In acute osteoarthritis, very severe pain is observed.
  3. If the third degree is damaged, the gap is noticeably narrowed and there are a large number of osteophytes on the surface of the bone. The temperature increases with deterioration.
  4. The 4th stage of the arthrosis of bones and joints is characterized by the fact that there is practically no gap together and the cavity is almost completely affected.

Depending on the type and location of the damage to the disease connections:

  • Osteoarthrosis is a degenerative dystrophic disease of a supportive motor apparatus with damage to the cartilage;
  • Multiple degenerative damage to the joints;
  • spoke about bone lesion;
  • Defeat of the shoulder joint;
  • Coksartrose is the osteoarthritis of the knee;
  • Reactive osteoarthritis is the damage to the joints after an infectious disease;
  • Hiking - temporary osteoarthritis;
  • Lesions of the ankle joint, wrist joint;
  • Degenerative diseases of the hands.

What is the risk of osteoarthritis

Without the desired treatment, this disease is dangerous several complications:

  • Complete destruction of the organ;
  • significant deformation;
  • Damage to the peripheral compounds;
  • Almost completely impossible to carry out movements that threaten the development of disabilities;
  • Violation of the spine, the development of intermediate omnia in it;
  • A significant decrease in the patient's quality of life.

Diagnostic methods

The diagnosis of joint diseases includes:

  • General inspection;
  • Palpation;
  • a procedure with which you can diagnose the volume and amplitude of the movements carried out;
  • Blood testing (general and biochemical);
  • Urine analysis;
  • Joint X -Ray;
  • Examination of a cartilage tissue under a microscope;
  • Ultrasonic;
  • MRI.

How to treat the joint

It is necessary to treat osteoarthritis as early as possible - this is the only way to suspend the development of the pathology and prevent the patient's complete immobilization. The main task of the doctor and the patient is to eliminate the causes of the destruction, the elimination of inflammatory processes. Remember that it is impossible to completely restore the joints, but treatment can improve your condition.

The principles of the treatment of the disease are the following:

  • get rid of excessive loads;
  • Classes of medical gymnastics in osteoarthritis;
  • Recipe of physiotherapy;
  • the purpose of going on the knees;
  • Spelled treatment;
  • Oxygen therapy;
  • Drug treatment;
  • Diet optimization.

Such drugs are prescribed from medication for the treatment of osteoarthritis.

  1. Non -steroidal anti -inflammatory medication. With your help you can effectively relieve pain and reduce the intensity of inflammatory processes. In addition, the recipe for ointment medication will be the most effective -they will remove the stomach -intestine mucosal damage.
  2. Corticosteroid medication relieve inflammatory phenomena and pain in the stage of tightening the process. Intra -Karticular administration of medicinal products is shown (such a procedure is only carried out under clinical conditions). Such products can be used for rheumatoid osteoarthritis.
  3. Arthrosis tablets with which the cartilage tissue of the joint is restored. Such funds must be used until a pronounced improvement and increase in the volume of the joint movements carried out. It is shown that it uses all medicines based on hyaluronic acid. The use of these medicines is often justified in the treatment of osteoarthritis of the knee joint.
  4. In the case of osteoarthritis, the use of other funds is given. An improvement after treatment with such drugs does not occur as in one month if the medication is constantly applied. Effective treatment with these drugs is possible if the patient corresponds to all the recipes of the doctor and, above all, has reduced excess weight.

In the event of very severe pain, the doctor can prescribe analgesics of the narcotics series. However, their use is limited due to the risk of complications.

The treatment of osteoarthritis with folk remedies can be used as auxiliary therapy. In addition, the doctor selects the most effective tool for each patient individually. An important place in such therapy is taken through the right nutrition.

Pay attention! Healing arthrosis, including the deformation of the arthrosis of the knee joint, is completely impossible. With the help of effective treatment, it is possible to suspend tissues and prevent the patient from being immobilized.

Nutrition and osteoarthritis

Power for osteoarthritis

With the progressive chronic destruction of the common cartilage, great attention should be paid to the appropriate nutrition. Exposure is strictly prohibited because excess body weight can cause further destruction of the joint. In order to reduce the weight, flour products must be excluded from diet, sweet. It is forbidden to drink alcoholic drinks and mainly beer.

But the fish should be on the table with osteoarthritis every day. It is best when it is low. It is particularly useful in the destruction of the joint. It contains a large amount of collagen health. It is absorbed by the body very quickly and fills the lack of cartilage tissue. The regular use of this delicious and healthy court makes the joints mobile, and the cartilage makes it elastic.

The daily menu should contain more products and dishes with vitamin B6 - pyridoxin. It occurs in legumes, nuts, potatoes, greens. It is useful to eat eggs, liver and dairy products - they are rich in riboflavin.

Prevention of osteoarthritis

The methods to prevent this disease are as follows:

  • Normalization of motor activity, elimination of hypodynamy;
  • A profession only from these sports that do not require excessive stress (fitness and aerobics are very useful for such a person);
  • Avoidance of severe physical work, which leads to intensive destruction of the joints;
  • Prevent excessive food, against overweight in all available and harmless way;
  • Exmination of all bad habits;
  • Regular walks in the fresh air;
  • Bathe;
  • Exclusion of stressful situations.

Osteoarthritis is much easier to warn than to treat it later. When you first appear in the joint, knot and restrictions of the doctor, you must visit the doctor immediately to check the joints. The start of treatment prevents the development of complications. Osteoarthritis is dangerous because a person can be hindered because of him.