Hand Arthritis - One Of The Many Faces Of Arthritis

Arthritis is commonly identified with pain. Since it affects the joints and is degenerative in nature, it causes a lot of inconvenience and despair. Often it starts with a tiny pain jolt in any one of the joints in the body - it could be the wrist, the fingers, the ankle, etc. Sometimes, arthritis is triggered by weather changes, while at other times it is directly caused by trauma.

Hand Arthritis Symptoms

There is no such specific arthritis that is called hand arthritis. However, the pain and swelling of the wrist, hand and fingers is caused by many types of arthritis such as rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis among others. Osteoarthritis has been known to attack the joints of the hand and fingers in particular. You could say that the majority of people who suffer from hand arthritis are patients of this type of arthritis.

The main cause for osteoarthritis is aging. There is loss of water in the joint and hence, friction occurs while moving. This, in turn makes the joint cartilage rub against one another and hence be gradually abraded. With time, the cartilage is ruptured and the bone is affected causing pain and swelling in the hand - hence, the hand arthritis.

Other causes are hormonal imbalances, lack of vitamins, protein and calcium, and sometimes even a very sedentary life. Overweight tends to aggravate the diseases and often the patient needs to lose weight to alleviate and check the pain and progress of the disease.

It is common with hand arthritis to find that fingers have grown extra bones (called bunions) which are extremely painful. The disfigurement is very common wherever the joints are affected by osteoarthritis. Hand arthritis also causes fingers to fuse together. Such deformations can be corrected only with the help of surgery. Doctors usually advise the patients to exercise the affected part continuously, lest the loss of cartilage would cause bone fusion.

You will find very similar symptoms (to hand arthritis) caused by rheumatoid arthritis as well. This usually affects women more than men. A blood test would be sufficient to confirm this diagnosis as it will show antibodies meant to fight alien organisms - this is a direct result of the malfunctioning of the immune system. Regular treatment can help in checking the progress of this disease; a good diet coupled with vitamins and calcium supplements can help a lot.

Normally, doctors prescribe Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs* (NSAIDs) and regular exercise. Yoga and a good number of herbal medicines have been found to be very useful as well in controlling the pain and restoring the capacity to move the joints freely.

* Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, usually abbreviated to NSAIDs, are drugs with analgesic, antipyretic and anti-inflammatory effects - they reduce pain, fever and inflammation. The term "non-steroidal" is used to distinguish these drugs from steroids, which (among a broad range of other effects) have a similar eicosanoid-depressing, anti-inflammatory action. As analgesics, NSAIDs are unusual in that they are non-narcotic. NSAIDs are sometimes also referred to as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory agents/analgesics (NSAIAs) or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medicines (NSAIMs). The most prominent members of this group of drugs are aspirin and ibuprofen. Paracetamol (acetaminophen) has negligible anti-inflammatory activity, and is strictly speaking not an NSAID.

Beginning in 1829, with the isolation of salicin from the folk remedy willow bark, NSAIDs have become an important part of the pharmaceutical treatment of pain (at low doses) and inflammation (at higher doses). Part of the popularity of NSAIDs is that, unlike opioids, they do not produce sedation or respiratory depression and have a very low addiction rate. NSAIDs, however, are not without their own problems. Certain NSAIDs, including ibuprofen and aspirin, have become accepted as relatively safe and are available over-the-counter without prescription.