StemCell Therapy

Do your hands hurt? Have they become stiff and painful? Do you find yourself asking for help with opening jars? Have you started to notice a decrease in your pinch and grip strength? If so, you may have wearing out of the small joints in your hand a very common condition known as arthritis.

Arthritis literally means inflamed joint. It results when cartilage begins to wear out and the bone ends become irregular. While arthritis can affect any joint in the body, it is often most noticeable in the small joints in the hand given their relatively minimal soft tissue envelope. This condition can be very painful and disabling especially when left untreated.

Osteoathritis (OA) is the most common form of arthritis, resulting from simple wear and tear over time. It is characterized by a degeneration or thinning of smooth cartilage end caps within the hand. This creates direct or bone on bone contact causing in pain and deformity. OA is most commonly seen in women over the age of 40; however, men are unfortunately not immune to it! Pain is typically the first symptom of this potentially disabling condition. This is especially prevalent with opening jars, turning door knobs, and writing. As the arthritis progresses, patients can even develop a bump at the base of the thumb from the deformed joint.

Arthritis is diagnosed from a combination of a clinical exam by your physician as well as X-rays. While X-rays are important in the diagnosis, they only tell part of the story. Some patients may have very bad arthritis on X-rays, but are not very symptomatic. On the other hand, some patients have relatively minimal arthritis on X-rays, but have a tremendous amount of pain.

Treatment of OA of the hand is aimed at minimizing pain and restoring as much function as possible. Your physician may recommend the use of topical medications or anti-inflammatory medicines like Ibuprofen and Naproxen. In addition, the use of braces (both soft and hard) can be helpful in managing OA especially in the base of thumb (CMC) joint. Finally, if symptoms persist despite these nonoperative modalities, your doctor may recommend surgery of which there are often good options available when the time comes.

Originally posted here:
Signs You May Have Arthritis - David Katz, MD | Online Athens - Online Athens (blog)

This entry was posted on June 3, 2017 at 9:42 am and is filed under Arthritis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed. |