There are over 100 different types of arthritis’ thus their symptoms vary from one type to another. Where does it hurt? If it is constantly hurting you in the joints and you are feeling stiff for no reason without any visible signs of puffiness, or if you are getting the chills or acquire a fever during no-stress activity these can be the precursors of osteoarthritis.
If you are feeling painful swelling and inflexibility in your fingers, or throughout your arms, legs or wrists and the pain is hitting you on both sides of your body these could be signs of rheumatoid arthritis. If your pain is heightened when you just wake up in the morning from sleep, this is another symptom of rheumatoid arthritis. Individuals with rheumatoid arthritis, suffer from extreme discomfort in their joint areas. This makes movement very difficult. They are usually overtaken with the need to rest, even if they have not under gone strenuous activity.
If you have an unexplained fever, if you are experiencing inflammation in your joints, or you feel like your skin is susceptible to pain from the slightest touch these could all be precursors to infectious arthritis.
If a child (bless and protect them all!) is incurring inflammatory disease, irregular fever, no longer is interested in food, is experiencing weight loss, anemia or discolored rashes on either the arms or legs, this may be a sign of juvenile arthritis.
Call your doctor and consult if the ache and inflexibility comes on suddenly and at various intervals. Whether you know the cause is from an injury or not you may be in the early stages of rheumatoid arthritis.
If you have noticed that the pain in your joint areas come along with a high fever you may have infectious arthritis.
When you are noticing that your arms, legs, or back after sitting upright for just a short period of time becomes more difficult and you can not get a restful night’s sleep you may be developing arthritis. There are two types that fit these descriptions and they include, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis.
Because arthritis and its many forms are rheumatic diseases they can create symptoms in other parts of your body outside of the joints. That is why symptoms to arthritis can include fever, swelling, a loss in weight, extreme tiredness, and overall ‘ill’ feeling and abnormal activity in the lungs, heart and kidneys.
As I mentioned earlier there are over 100 different kinds of arthritis. You can have any one of them. Consulting your doctor will help you obtain an exact diagnosis for your particular type of arthritis. Your doctor can do this by assessing your medical history, going through a physical with you, as well as having particular lab tests and x-rays done on you.
Although the various arthritis forms are not 100% curable, there are treatments available that making living with arthritis less painful. Early detection is also very important and can save a person from complete disability.