Here at beth-shean.org, we’ve talked a lot about skin care issues affecting babies and younger children. There’s also been discussion of health issues relating to children of nursery and primary school age.
Today, we’re turning our attention to our readers that are sometimes referred to as the ‘silver surfers’, we’re broadly talking about skin care still, but for pensioners.
Arthritis affects the joints and causes pain when certain parts of the body move. A common area that this occurs is the wrists and fingers – often both together but can be one or the other too.
Typically it’s an older person’s condition, but does occur in younger adults too and rarely even teenagers. Its a bit like moving parts in an engine seizing up, and pain comes from joint’s not having their natural oiling process keeping things moving slowly.
There are two common types of arthritis conditions, Osteoarthritis and Rheumatoid.
Osteoarthritis
The first type, osteoarthritis, occurs when the joints begin to deteriorate – you can think of this as them breaking down as a result of wearing out. This is why it typically occurs in older age, but if you have an inherent weakness in a given joint (or multiple joints), it can occur at virtually any point in life.
Rheumatoid Arthritis
The other really common type is rheumatoid arthritis, which usually causes pain as swelling occurs in the joint. This might be due to friction irritating tissue as the joint moves. Generally speaking, the base cause of rheumatoid arthritis cases is the body attacking itself and causing problems in the joint, called auto immune disease.
Treating Arthritis
Historically, treatment for arthritis is most commonly done with specially designed supports, which are like gloves for the affected area. They work by supporting the joint and therefore helping and encouraging the repair process in the joint. Unfortunately, you’re unlikely to get results in less than the few weeks, and usually you’ll need to use them for many months to get lasting results.
Alternative treatments can include painkillers, but unless used for anti inflammatory purposes will not help the underlying cause, but simply treat the pain in the patient to improve the quality of life.
More recently, there has been more research into treatments for arthritis that have previously been used in beauty salons, so might be more associated with pampering that treatments by patients. A great example is using the soothing properties of a paraffin wax bath to warm the joints and reduce pain and swelling in a very non invasive manner. They work very simply by warming wax so melt into a liquid form and placing the affected area into the bath. The warmth is investigated to see if it can reliably improve a patient’s condition, both quickly as a pain relieving treatment and more longer term to work towards a pain free life.