Osteoarthritis is a chronic joint disease that affects all bony joints in the body, such as the knee, hand, hip, foot and spine. The most common form is osteoarthritis of the knee. Most patients complain of pain or swelling in the left/right knee joint with no apparent cause and limited motion.
Osteoarthritis represents the aging of the joint and is therefore called age-related arthritis. The pain is often worse when walking up and down stairs and squatting, and it is worse in rainy weather. There is a lot to learn about osteoarthritis, so let’s learn more about it!
Symptoms of osteoarthritis.
1, joint swelling: caused by local bony hypertrophy or exudative synovitis, can be accompanied by increased local temperature, effusion and synovial hypertrophy, severe osteoarthritis patients can be seen joint deformity, subluxation, etc.
2, pressure pain and passive pain: is a common sign of osteoarthritis, the affected joint can have local pressure pain, especially when accompanied by synovial exudation. Sometimes patients with osteoarthritis do not have pressure pain, but pain can occur when moving passively.
3, joint activity popping (bone friction sound): the knee joint is common. The development of osteoarthritis to the late stage due to the degeneration of articular cartilage, peeling, will expose the bone under the cartilage. When the joint is moving, the bones under the cartilage at both ends are exposed and make a sound when touching each other.
4. Restricted movement: Osteoarthritis can lead to restricted joint movement due to bone redundancy, loss of cartilage, muscle spasm around the joint, and joint destruction.
Location of osteoarthritis: 1.
1.Foot
The leading toe joint is a common site for lesions to appear. Wearing tight footwear and repeated trauma are its causes. Symptoms are localized pain, bony hypertrophy and bunions.
2.Hip
The symptoms are pain in the greater trochanter, lateral hip and groin, which may radiate to the knee. The internal rotation and extension of the hip is limited. Osteoarthritis of the hip occurs less in our population than in Caucasians.
3.Knee
Knee pain is a common complaint of patients with this disease. The early symptoms are pain when going up and down stairs, especially when going downstairs, unilateral or bilateral, and joint enlargement, mostly due to bony hypertrophy, or joint effusion. Synovial hypertrophy is rare. In severe cases, the knee is deformed.
4. Hand
The interphalangeal joints are most often involved, especially the distal interphalangeal joints. Swelling and pressure pain are less pronounced and rarely affect joint movement.
The causes of osteoarthritis are
1, climate factors: people who often live in humid, cold environments have a high incidence, such as some young white-collar women wear dresses in air-conditioned office buildings all year round, they often become a high incidence of osteoarthritis. This is mainly due to the low temperature, causing local blood flow slowdown or even disorders related.
2, due to genetic factors: the abnormalities of the composition of the joint structure, especially the pathological aging of cartilage cells is also an important factor in the occurrence of this disease.
3, biomechanical factors: when walking in high heels, the function of the hip, knee and ankle joints are greatly changed due to torsion, and the hip and knee joints compensate to maintain a stable gait, which leads to damage to joint cartilage.
4, sports injuries: young people due to trauma or sports injuries can cause intra-articular fractures, or rupture of the cruciate ligaments and damage to the lateral collateral ligaments, etc., which then triggers instability of the knee joint and abnormal wear and tear of the articular cartilage, resulting in traumatic osteoarthritis.
Treatment methods for osteoarthritis.
1.Physical therapy
Steam baths, hot spring baths, and heat therapies have a short-term relief effect on the stiffness and pain symptoms of patients. Acupuncture and tui-na are also effective in reducing the symptoms of osteoarthritis.
2.Therapeutic application of traditional Chinese medicine
Traditional black ointment has a large drug load, strong penetration, and can work for a long time, and has few side effects on patients. The external application of Chinese medicine to treat arthritis is aimed at dispelling wind and cold, relieving spasm and blood stasis, and also warming the kidneys and helping the yang to strengthen the bones, so as to achieve the purpose of strengthening the tendons and bones and eradicating joint inflammation.
3.Surgical method
The surgical method is suitable for patients with late spasticity and atrophy, deformity and destruction of the joints. The risk of surgery is high, and the traumatic area of the surgical method is relatively large, and it should be used with caution because arthritis patients are mostly older than 60 years old.
4.Adjunctive physical therapy
In the acute stage, pain relief, swelling and improvement of function are the main focus; in the chronic stage, enhancing local blood circulation and improving joint function are the main focus. Note: Arthroplasty and joints containing metal components are prohibited from heat transmission or ultrasound therapy to avoid deep burning injuries.
How to effectively prevent osteoarthritis?
1, try to avoid physical obesity, to prevent aggravation of the burden on the joints, once the body is overweight, we must actively lose weight and control weight.
2, pay attention to walking and labor posture, do not twist the body to walk and work. Avoid squatting for a long time, because the weight of the knee joint when squatting is 3 to 6 times its own weight, squatting at work (such as car mechanics, sand turners) better reputation to a low sitting position (sitting on a small bench), sitting and standing for a long time, but also to frequently change positions to prevent the knee joint fixed a posture and excessive force.
3, do not wear high heels when walking long distances, wear thick-soled and flexible soft-soled shoes to reduce the impact on the knee joint, to avoid wear and tear on the knee joint.
4, when participating in physical exercise should be well prepared activities, gently stretch the knee joint, so that the knee joint fully active before participating in strenuous exercise. When practicing leg press, do not lift your leg too high to prevent excessive strain on the knee joint. When practicing taijiquan, do not squat too low, and do not play several sets in a row to prevent injury to the knee joint from being overburdened.
5, when riding a bicycle, to adjust the height of the seat, to sit on the seat of the two feet in the pedals, both legs can be straight or slightly bent for the appropriate, the seat is too high, too low or riding uphill when pedaling hard, the knee joint have adverse effects, should be overcome.
6, the knee joint encounter cold, vasoconstriction, blood circulation becomes poor, often making the pain worse, so in cold weather should pay attention to keep warm, if necessary, wear a knee brace to prevent the knee joint from cold.
7. People with osteoarthritis of the knee should try to walk up and down stairs, climb less, stand less, and lift less heavy objects to avoid overloading the knee joint and aggravating the condition.
8, both to avoid excessive fatigue of the knee joint, but also to carry out appropriate functional exercise to increase the stability of the knee joint, to prevent muscle atrophy of the leg, which not only relieves joint pain, but also prevents the progress of the disease, do not think that only rest and inactivity to protect the diseased knee joint.
According to research, people with knee osteoarthritis, swimming and walking are exercises with a better reputation, which do not increase the weight-bearing capacity of the knee joint, but also allow the muscles and ligaments around the knee joint to be exercised. Secondly, sit-ups, push-ups, bridge arches and the repeated practice of raising and lowering the two retreats on the supine bed, imitating pedaling a bicycle, are all exercises that have a good reputation among patients.
9, in terms of diet, should eat more food containing protein, calcium, collagen, isoflavones, such as milk, dairy products, soybeans, soy products, eggs, fish and shrimp, kelp, black fungus, chicken claws, pig’s feet, lamb shanks, beef tendons, etc. These can supplement protein, calcium, prevent osteoporosis, but also to grow cartilage and joint lubricating fluid, but also supplement estrogen, so that bones and joints better calcium metabolism and reduce the symptoms of arthritis.
Osteoarthritis brings a lot of harm to our body, so once found, we should be treated in a timely manner, do not miss the best time for treatment, because the knee joint is very important to our body, we should also pay attention to protect our knee joint health in general, try to avoid the occurrence of disease.
In conclusion, osteoarthritis is a disease that slowly evolves with age and different treatment measures should be chosen at different times of the disease. Winter is a high incidence of the disease and patients should actively prevent it and cooperate with the treatment in order to obtain the desired quality of life.