Causes | Signs of Arthritis

Being pregnant can make you sore from carrying the extra weight inside of you. Also sleeping on your side in the later stages of pregnancy can cause back and neck pains. This is normal, and can be eased with traditional remedies such as body massage and warm baths. The medical term for chronic, systemic arthritis is Rheumatoid arthritis (RA). In the United States, 1 in 100 people suffer from this condition and it is three times more likely to afflict women than men. In severe cases the disease can be completely debilitating. There is good news for you, however, if you are a sufferer of rheumatoid arthritis and are pregnant. Your symptoms are likely to lesson during pregnancy.

Pregnancy advice is important for women with arthritis and other rheumatic diseases who worry about becoming pregnant. Some women with rheumatic diseases have even been advised against becoming pregnant. It is unknown exactly why pregnant women have significantly less symptoms of arthritis during pregnancy, but the statistics have been proven. What is your chance of improved conditions for your RA during pregnancy? Between 70 -80 %. There are varying theories to why the intensity of pain from RA decreases while pregnant, and they are medically technical. I’m no doctor myself; however my compilation of the technical reasons follows in a simple explanation. As the woman’s body changes to prepare for delivery she becomes more resistant to pain in general. This general reduction in sensitivity to pain results in not the stimulation of the nerves from RA being reduced, but rather from the perception of it being received in the brain. Please take this unproven theory with a grain of salt, but the fact remains that you’ll be sleeping easier.

The worry comes from uncertainty about how a woman’s rheumatic condition will affect the pregnancy as well as how pregnancy will affect her rheumatic condition. If you have arthritis and you are pregnant or if becoming pregnant is a consideration, know what pregnancy advice applies to your condition.

One important matter to consider is the postponement of the usage of medication for RA until after birth. Medicines for this condition have been documented to cause birth defects. There are other medications which you could switch to that would not have the same chance of affecting the child. Of course, you must consult with your doctor regarding this. Luckily, if you’re a sufferer from RA there is relief on the horizon if you’re pregnant. Now you’ll just have normal neck and back pain like everybody else!

When is comes to losing baby weight there are many additional things to consider such as your medical history. But either way, losing weight after pregnancy doesn’t have to be difficult and you can even improve your health at the same time.

Learning the cause of any type of pain is a critical step in the healing process. This is especially true for the tricky yet oh so painful sciatica. But what is Sciatica? How is it diagnosed? Can it be healed?

What is Sciatica?
Many folks confuse sciatica to be a diagnosis. It’s not. It’s a symptom of a different problem. But finding the problem can be…well, a problem. Think of it this way: You pull out a string of Christmas lights to put on your tree. You plug it in to be sure they work…but they don’t. So you check the fuse. It’s good. Now what? You systematically start looking at each bulb to find the one that is missing or burned out. It’s a painstaking process of hit and miss. That’s the same kind of problem doctors are facing—albeit much more intricate and critical—when they are trying to pinpoint the cause of sciatica.

Finding the source of sciatica can be difficult at best because it can be caused by a number of different conditions anywhere along the roots of the five sciatic nerves. The roots stem from the lumbar and sacral nerve lines which string down the spine in the L4 to the S3 vertebrae regions. Just about anything can go wrong in that area and cause sciatica to manifest itself in your buttocks, leg, knee or foot. You’ll know it when it occurs because it hurts! But moderate to severe pain is not the only challenge. Numbness, tingling, pins and needles and muscle weakness are signs of sciatica as well.

The most common culprit behind sciatica is nerve pinching. Nerves can get pinched in a variety of ways ranging from lumbar misalignment, a sacroiliac joint misalignment, Piriformis syndrome, greater Trochanteric Bursitis and most commonly, disc herniation.

How is Sciatica Diagnosed?
The standard protocol no matter what kind of doctor is consulted is for an examination to be performed first. If the sciatica does not extend below the knee, it is less likely that it is due to a disc problem, and it’s more likely that it’s due to a lumbar misalignment, a sacroiliac joint misalignment, Piriformis syndrome or Greater Trochanteric Bursitis. If on the other hand the sciatica does extend below the knee, it is somewhat more likely that it is due to a disc lesion.

Once the examination is performed the next steps differ depending on what type of doctor is doing the examining. If it’s a chiropractor, it is most likely that after the examination he will take an x-ray to rule out any kind of pathological process (such as bone cancer), and then treat the patient with chiropractic adjustments and physiotherapy. If the patient does not respond favorably within a week or two to this conservative approach, then the doctor will request pre-authorization from the insurance company for an MRI. It is unlikely that an insurance company will approve an MRI until after conservative treatment has been tried first and failed.

If however the patient is complaining of neurological symptoms such as numbness in the leg or weakness of any of the muscles of the leg, particularly the inability to walk on their heels (a condition called foot-drop), or loss of control of bowel or bladder function, then those neurological signs justify immediate approval and performance of an MRI. To not do an MRI in such a case could constitute negligence and could jeopardize the patient’s life, if not their ability to walk normally for the rest of their life.

An MD will approach things a little differently than a chiropractor. An MD will likely first prescribe some pain killers and anti-inflammatory medicine. If that doesn’t work then they’ll prescribe physical therapy. An MRI will be ordered if the therapy fails to relieve the pain. Unless of course the patient demonstrates neurological signs and symptoms in which case the same urgency exists as in the above paragraph.

It is important to note that X-rays do not show whether or not a disc is bulging or ruptured. They only show the disc space, showing if it’s normal-sized, or thin. If it’s thin, it could show some Signs of Arthritis. Occasionally an inflamed disc can show up on an x-ray as somewhat thicker than usual.

MRI’s and CT’s both show discs and will differentiate a normal healthy disc from an unhealthy one. They will also show if a disc is bulged or herniated and will show how well hydrated it is. Generally speaking, CT’s are best to show hard tissues such as bone, and MRI’s are best to show soft tissues like discs and nerves. So if arthritis or fractures are suspected by the ordering physician, a CT is ordered. If a disc bulge or herniation is suspected, then an MRI is ordered. Bone cancer, cord tumors, bone abscesses, meningeoceles and other diseases can be detected by MRIs and CTs.

Can Sciatica be cured?
The more correct question is, “Can sciatica be relieved?” Remember sciatica is a symptom not a diagnosis. So whether or not sciatica can be relieved depends on whether or not the cause of the sciatica can be fixed.

The good news is that since the most common cause of sciatica is an impinged nerve usually resulting from a herniated or bulging disc, the answer is yes: Sciatica can be relieved with a fairly high success rate depending on how the problem is addressed. Many successful tactics can be implemented by your chiropractor or MD. They range from spinal decompression to surgery on the extreme end to core muscle strengthening, stretches, yoga and acupuncture on the more conservative end.

If the diagnosis is something other than a disc problem, the treatments can vary quite a bit…more than can be covered in this article.

Conclusion
The cause of sciatica can be very hard to diagnose. If you or a loved one is suffering, definitely seek help. Visit your chiropractor or MD, based on your preference. To do nothing may cause irreversible damage that may affect your ability to walk. Rest assured, help is out there. Relief is within reach.

Suffer from lower back pain, sciatica, herniated disc? Stats show spinal fusion surgery is not very effective. Michael Harris author’s a blog for healing your back.

“If you have a lot of tension and you get a headache, do what it says on the aspirin bottle”: “Take two aspirin” and “Keep away from children” – author unknown. Migraine sufferers are everywhere, and anyone can suffer from them. They are mothers and fathers, daughters and sons, professionals and sanitation workers, young and old. Most people think that a migraine is only a headache. But chronic sufferers know that these are not ordinary headaches. The pain that these people feel is often debilitating. Yet non-sufferers and even some medical professionals believe that it’s all their heads The truth is the pain is real, and yes, it is definitely in their heads, but also their jaws, ears, eyes, sinuses and necks as well. It is amazing just how much a true migraine headache can affect an individual. It can interfere with a person’s home life, work productivity and relationships with family and friends. It makes recreation and exercise very difficult, and can interfere with an individual’s ability to enjoy life. Many headache sufferers will try to treat themselves at first, and then will finally go to see a doctor. Yet often they can only get temporary relief. Chronic headache sufferers generally have a poorer quality of life compared with people with other disorders, such as arthritis.

Migraine headache effect 28 million Americans on a regular basis. Approximately 25% have four or more attacks each month.Disability from migraines occurs in as many as 80% of sufferers. It is not unusual to meet people who are so disabled by their headaches that getting from their beds to the bathroom is a major endeavor. But “It’s only a headache.” Society does not understand the impact that headaches have on the people who suffer from them. People can miss work due to a head cold or the flu, but if they call in with a headache, they are considered lazy. A migraine or tension headache is a debilitating disorder that can literally control a person’s life.

Headaches are the number one complaint that patients go to the neurologist for, and the number three cause of lost workdays. It is estimated that approximately 45 million Americans have chronic headache of some type, including migraines. At least half of these people experience headaches severe enough to be disabling part of the time. This can be rather costly: regular victims of chronic headaches make over 8 million visits to their doctor’s office every year. Migraine sufferers alone lose over 157 million workdays due to headache pain. The economic toll on society of all of these lost work days is staggering. Not to mention the devastating impact that these headaches have upon the individual’s quality of life.

Luckily, with advances in Medicine and Dentistry, there is hope for these sufferers. Headache treatment on a regular basis using Neuromuscular Dentistry has met wtih great success.

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Other related topics – Causes of Arthritis | Natural Arthritis Treatment