1. What is ankylosing spondylitis? Ankylosing spondylitis is a systemic, chronic, inflammatory disease that primarily affects the mid-axis joints. The lesions mainly involve the sacroiliac joints, the spine and peripheral joints, as well as multiple organs such as the eyes, heart and lungs, and often lead to ankylosing deformities of the spinal joints in advanced patients. It is more common in young adults, more in men than in women, and is associated with genetic factors. The lesions are mainly chronic inflammation of the attachment points of the medial joints and tendon ligaments. The disease has a slow onset, a long course, and a high disability rate. In advanced stages, the spine is “bamboo-like”, resulting in joint dysfunction, loss of work capacity and reduced quality of life. The actual fact is that you must go to a regular hospital in time to get early diagnosis and early treatment to minimize the disability rate and improve the quality of life. 2. What are the early manifestations of ankylosing spondylitis? The first thing you need to do is to get a good idea of what you are getting into. Because of the mildness of the disease, most patients fail to go to a specialist in a timely manner, resulting in delays and loss of the best time for treatment. The most common symptom of ankylosing spondylitis is lumbosacral pain, mostly vague, with lumbar stiffness in the morning, and often relieved after activity, which should be highly alert to the possibility of the disease and should be promptly seen by a rheumatology specialist. It is not uncommon for some patients to have acute inflammation of peripheral joints with high fever and asymmetry as the first symptom, and such patients are mostly seen in adolescents and are easily misdiagnosed. Other patients present early with inflammation of tendons, ligaments and other attachment points such as heel pain. For young male patients, if the above-mentioned manifestations appear to go to a regular hospital rheumatology specialist in order to early detection, early diagnosis and early treatment. 3. Is ankylosing spondylitis hereditary? Although ankylosing spondylitis is not a hereditary disease, but in recent years a lot of research has shown that ankylosing spondylitis has a certain genetic tendency, the onset of the existence of family aggregation, and human leukocyte antigen HLA-B27 has a close correlation. For example, among first-degree relatives of patients with ankylosing spondylitis, the prevalence of HLA-B27-positive individuals can be 11％ to 21％ and the consistency of ankylosing spondylitis in monozygotic twins exceeds 50％ indicating a genetic susceptibility in HLA-B27-positive populations. Genes play a dominant role in its pathogenesis, and the main genetic factors involved are HLA-B27, in addition to other genes involved within and outside the HLA region. Although there is a correlation between the development of ankylosing spondylitis and genetics, it is not a one-to-one absolute inheritance. Therefore, patients with ankylosing spondylitis do not need to cause panic, their children and other offspring can be regularly examined and followed up at regular hospitals, and the influence of environmental factors and other avoidable factors (such as trauma, overwork, cold, humidity and intestinal infections) can be minimized in general.