# Arthritis
Psoriatic arthritis -- An inflammatory articulation disorder that may occur in psoriasis patients. While the most common form, osteoarthritis, is a degenerative condition that worsens with age, the many forms of inflammatory arthritis can affect people at any age. In fact, arthritis can occur in a variety of forms and can impact people at any age, including children and adolescents. A joint damaged in a trauma is most likely to eventually develop arthritis.
In arthritis, a joint becomes stiff, and the range of motion may become limited. The primary symptoms of arthritis are pain and stiffness of the joints, usually increasing in severity as you get older.
If you experience body pain and stiffness, or have difficulty moving, you may be suffering from arthritis. If you have arthritis, joints become inflamed, which causes discomfort and pain. This is the form of arthritis that children get, which causes inflammation and stiffness of joints. Arthritis is a common disease that causes pain and inflammation in joints.
Arthritis typically involves inflammation or degeneration (breakdown) in a joint. Arthritis means inflammation in joints, but the term is used to describe about 200 conditions affecting joints, tissues surrounding joints, and other connective tissues. Although joint inflammation is a symptom or a sign, not a specific diagnosis, the term arthritis is generally used to describe any condition that involves joints. Arthritis actually describes more than 100 different conditions affecting joints and surrounding tissues.
Arthritis is not just a single disorder, it is the umbrella term for more than 100 conditions that affect joints throughout the body. Arthritis is a condition that affects joints (the areas where bones meet and move). Arthritis is swelling and tenderness in one or more of your joints.
Rheumatoid arthritis occurs when the bodys immune system targets the affected joints, leading to pain and swelling. The bodys immune system may cause painful swelling and stiffness in and around joints, and it may also trigger a red, scaly skin rash called psoriasis. When someone has auto-immune disease, the immune system wrongly attacks the bodys healthy tissues, like joints, causing inflammation. Most forms of arthritis are thought to result from an error in the immune system, which causes the body to attack its own tissues in the joints.
Inflammatory arthritis is a systemic disorder wherein mechanisms normally protecting the body instead attack the joints and tissues themselves. Inflammatory arthritis is an auto-immune disease, in which your immune system causes joint pain and swelling. Arthritis and other rheumatic diseases cause pain, swelling, and restricted movement of joints and connective tissues throughout the body.
Rheumatic diseases include any conditions that cause pain, stiffness, and swelling in joints, muscles, tendons, ligaments, or bones. Symptoms can include pain, stiffness, swelling, heat, or redness in 1 or more joints. Rheumatic conditions generally include pain, aches, stiffness, and swelling in and around one or more joints. In its earliest stages, gouty arthritis typically occurs in a single joint, but over time, it may present itself in many joints, and can be quite incapacitating.
The early stages of osteoarthritis may cause internal joint damage, along with pain and stiffness. Osteoarthritis can happen at any age, either from injury or from being associated with other conditions that affect joints, such as gout or RA. Because osteoarthritis causes joints to get worse over time, it can lead to a loss of function.
The two major types of arthritis--osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis--injure joints differently. Osteoarthritis involves wearing down your joints cartilage, a tough, slippery covering at the ends of bones that forms joints. The most common forms typically involve one or more of the largest, weight-bearing joints, like the hip or knee. Pain, which may range in severity, is a common symptom of almost all types of arthritis.
Secondary arthritis -- A type of arthritis that may develop after an injury to a joint, and sometimes occurs years later. Reactive arthritis - This causes inflammation in joints, eyes, and urethra (the tube that carries urine). Enthesitis-related arthritis - can cause pain on the soles of your feet, as well as around your knees and hips, where ligaments attach to your bones.
It can affect the shoulders, hips, ribs, and the smaller joints in the hands and feet. A small proportion will develop a severe, painful, destructive form of arthritis that destroys small joints of the hands, which may result in permanent disability and loss of function in the hands. In some diseases where arthritis occurs, other organs, like your eyes, heart, or skin, may be affected.
A lack of physical activity because of the pain from arthritis may result in debilitation, decreased function, loss of independence, and social isolation. If you become sedentary because of your joint pain, you could be at increased risk of developing cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and other serious conditions. Some types of arthritis also raise your risk for developing other chronic conditions, such as lung disease, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Rheumatoid arthritis typically attacks joints in your fingers, wrists, knees, and elbows, is symmetrical (it appears on the same side of your body), and may cause serious deformities within a few years if it is left untreated.
Cervical Spondylosis - Also known as degenerative osteoarthritis, cervical spondylitis involves joints and bones in the neck, causing pain and stiffness. Ankylosing spondylitis - A long-term, inflammatory condition primarily affecting bones, muscles, and ligaments in the spine, leading to stiffness and fusion of joints. With rheumatoid arthritis, the synovial membranes which protect and lubricate joints become inflamed, leading to pain and swelling. Infectious arthritis is an infection that has spread from another part of the body to a joint.
Osteoarthritis (OA) is more likely to attack your weight-bearing joints, like the knee, hip, lower spine, or big toe, but it may cause pain and stiffness in the joints of your thumb or fingers, too.