In nutshell Arthritis is referred as the inflammatory medical condition of muscular skeletal tissues. But saying that, we cannot encompass the disease in its multifarious types and medical conditions and it is better to refer arthritis as the group of medical conditions corresponding to muscular skeletal tissues. There are various types of Arthritis like Osteoarthritis, Rheumatoid arthritis, Gout, Psoriatic Arthritis, Septic Arthritis, Ankylosing spondylitis, Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis, Scleroderma, Lupus, etc and under some of this groups there can be great range of variations and types. There are practically more than 100 different types of Osteoarthritis and there are variations in medical conditions in all types of arthritis making the disease one of the most challenging for medical treatment and diagnosis.
How Arthritis is caused?
To know about Arthritis one needs to know the disease in its clinical detail and for having a detailed picture of the muscular skeletal deformations and inflammatory syndromes one should have an idea of how the muscles and joints in our body makes movement and how their normal state of functioning gets distorted to give way for Arthritis.
Arthritis is a disease that takes root in joints. Joints in the body are those portions where two bones face each other and without collision or rubbing each other smoothly move and thus make way for the surrounding muscles to move. Now these joints apart from the bones have some organic elements that help the bones to move and make way for smooth movement of our hands, legs and other muscular skeletal joints in the body. With the erosion, drying up and non-functioning of some of these skeletal tissues the inflammation in the joint or painful syndromes in making joint movement are caused.
Ligaments just like elastic bands hold the two bones together within the joint and the joint is normally encircled by a capsule. Between the two adjacent bones there is synovial fluid that makes the bones to move smoothly and on the surface of every bone there is a layer of cartilage that assures that the two bones at the time of making movement do not rub or collide with each other.
There are mainly two causes of Arthritis for majority of the Type of Arthritis, either the cartilage on your bones are wearing away or the synovial fluid in between the bones is simply lacking. In either case the movement of the joints becomes tremendously painful and it then is called arthritis. What exactly the type of Arthritis can only be determined according to the diagnosis of the medical condition that would reveal either the lack of synovial fluid or withering away of cartilage.
Osteoarthritis
In normal condition of the joints our bones do not glide on top of one another because the ligaments like firm elastic bands do not let the bones move in an abrupt fashion and the bones cannot rub with one another because of the presence of a layer of cartilage on their surface. In Osteoarthritis this cartilage actually wears away and makes room for the bones to collide or rub causing immense pain and thereby inhibits movement to a great extent. Osteoarthritis is the most common type of arthritis to make millions of peoples suffer all over the world. The withering away of the cartilage can be of varied effects and stages and according to that Osteoarthritis can be of various types. Osteoarthritis tends to be severe with age.
Rheumatoid Arthritis
As per the clinical experts the exact cause of Rheumatoid Arthritis is still unknown and several researches shown that this particular type of Arthritis is a chronic one and is an autoimmune disease. Autoimmune disease is something which is occurred because of reverse or malfunctioning of our immune system. The purpose of immune system is to attack the harmful bacteria and alien viruses to protect the body. Now in autoimmune diseases the immune system attacks the healthy cells of the body in some organic functions. When the healthy cells of the joints over the time due to malfunctioning attack of immune disorder begin to experience fatigue, numbness, pain in movement and inflammation severity of which would only increase over time and would encompass other joints, muscles and organs, it is Rheumatoid Arthritis that the patient is attacked with. People with Rheumatoid Arthritis are more prone to severe malfunction of other important organs and diseases like heart attack, kidney failure.
Gout
One of the most common types of Arthritis that has even been described in historical accounts much before the modern medical science came into practice is Gout. Gout is a type of Arthritis that is characterized by sudden stiffness, swelling, inflammation, pain of the joints. In Gout the temperature of the joint can be felt even as hot and can look red with swelling. Gout unlike other major types of Arthritis may or may not be causing the regular syndrome but can be observed and felt with the above mentioned syndromes suddenly. To the affected the recurrent syndromes of Gout are most dominantly seen in the ankles and feet. Gout is mainly caused by excessive presence of uric acid in the blood stream and normally along with treatment a dietary control for controlling uric acid intake through food stuff is prescribed for patients suffering from Gout.
Psoriatic Arthritis
Unlike other types of Arthritis Psoriatic Arthritis is rather the culmination of another disease called Psoriasis. Psoriasis manifests in the human body as a visible skin disorder, in reality which is basically a disorderly syndrome of particular type of tissue. In Psoriasis the skin becomes reddish and palpable or flaky with silvery scales showing up on the surface. Gradually this medical condition develops into joint problem or Arthritis. Sometimes the typical Psoriatic skin condition can develop later following the joint disorder. Almost 30 percent of all Psoriasis cases are diagnosed with Psoriatic Arthritis as per medical observation worldwide.
Septic Arthritis
Septic Arthritis is caused by infection of joints by a fungi or harmful bacteria. The infection of the joint can be exclusive meaning that only the joint is infected while the rest of the body remained unharmed and in a different medical condition the infectious bacteria can travel through blood stream to the joint and can cause infection. In any cause the infection may cause severe swelling, pain and other arthritic syndromes. Septic Arthritis though not a chronic and continued disorder of the joints like other Arthritis it can severely damage the joints in a few days of time and this is why it is termed as a medical emergency.
Ankylosing Spondylitis
Normally this Arthritis is also referred as the Ankylosing Spondylitis in the medical terminology, but as this occurs in the spinal muscular skeletal tissues it can both be referred as the spondylitis (relating to spine) and Arthritis (relating to muscular skeletal tissues). In this type of Arthritis scar tissues are formed and take the spaces in the chain of the bones that make up the spine. These scar tissues can turn into solid bone gradually and can inhibit spinal movement to a great extent. Inhibition of spinal movement and severe inflammation in the spine are the main symptoms of Ankylosing spondylitis.
Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis
It is another type of Arthritis that is caused by autoimmune disease, though the exact clinical cause of this Arthritis is still unknown. As the name suggest it normally occurs in children and the symptoms are common as other types of Arthritis like stiffness, swelling in the joint, pain in moving the joints, warm, swollen and red joints. Just like the autoimmune Arthritis like the Rheumatoid arthritis the immune system of the body attacks the healthy cells of the body and it affects the tissues of the joints causing arthritic syndromes. This arthritis occurs in children and younger people normally aged below 16 years of age and can affect a child as young as just 6 months old.
Scleroderma
Scleroderma is an autoimmune disorder of tissues that can cause various malfunctioning or derogatory changes in the blood vessels, organs, bones, muscles and skin. As an effect this autoimmune disease attacking the tissues of the joints can cause severe arthritis. When Scleroderma affects the tissues of the joints, they get hardened and stiffened ending in arthritis causing severe stiffness, pain and inflammation. In many cases the disease affects only the skin but in systematic scleroderma various organs, joints and muscles and even blood vessels can be affected.
Lupus
Lupus is another type of autoimmune disease where the healthy tissues of the body are attacked by the immune system causing chronic syndromes in different organs and parts of the body. The most important thing about this particular type of Arthritis is that excess fluid can be observed in the joints far from the center of the body, especially in the hands and legs and in normal diagnostic procedure with X-Rays Lupus and its syndromes are not seen in most cases. Lupus in most cases is diagnosed by the doctor with physical diagnosis by examining the patient. The behavior of this Arthritis can be very hectic and topsy-turvy causing sometimes severe inflammation and painful movement or sometimes a sudden and unexpected relief from the symptoms.
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