Rheumatoid arthritis: what is it and do you have it?

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is the most common type of inflammatory arthritis, affecting only about one per cent of Canadians, with women accounting for three of every four people affected. It can begin at any age, but commonly develops in young and middle-aged adults.

• RA is a systemic disease. What this means is that RA can affect not only the joints but also the blood vessels, heart, skin, muscles and other parts of the body.
• Most people with RA must contend with daily pain and stiffness, which may wax and wane.
• They often speak of having good days and bad days, weeks or months and of enduring periods of depression, anxiety and helplessness.
• In these cases, a self-empowerment approach can play a central role in helping people with RA gain control over their disease and their lives.

• RA and osteoarthritis are often mistaken for each other — which can cause serious problems, since the two types of arthritis are treated quite differently.
• Although symptoms may be similar, RA and OA are very different diseases.
• Osteoarthritis can affect any joint that has cartilage — freely movable joints such as the knee or slightly movable joints like the vertebrae.
• By contrast, RA focuses on the body's freely movable joints and on one area in particular: the synovial membrane, which is the inner lining of the capsule surrounding freely movable joints.
• Once this joint becomes inflamed, the characteristic symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis — heat, swelling, stiffness and pain — begin to appear.
• If you have arthritis, you may swear that your stiffness and pain get worse when the weather changes.
• And they probably do. Studies using climate chambers have found that people with arthritis really do experience increased stiffness and pain when the barometric pressure drops quickly or when the humidity suddenly rises.
• While osteoarthritis confines its damage to the joints, RA is a systemic disease that can damage not only the joints but also other parts of the body such as blood vessels, the eyes and the heart.
• This tissue damage is caused by chronic inflammation — the hallmark of RA.
• Although inflammation can also occur in osteoarthritis, it is confined to the affected joints.