Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) belongs to a large family of diseases collectively known as Connective Tissue Diseases. All tissues of the body can be divided into 4 big groups. First group, the epithelia, they include cells that made up our skin and secretory glands, and mucous lining. Second group, muscle tissues and third nervous tissues.
While the rest of the tissues that do not belong to the above mentioned 3 groups are collectively called "connective tissues", they are the fourth and largest group. Connective tissues present in every part of our body, they form structures ranging from bones, interstitial of internal organs, cartilages of joints to walls of blood vessels. Connective tissues diseases are inflammatory diseases that cause destruction of various connective tissues, target may be different for each specific disease, but nevertheless they all have one thing in common - they are all auto-immune diseases.
So, what are the most common false believes about RA?
1. It only involve joint - nothing can be further from the truth, RA is a systemic disease, almost always it involves joints, but not only joints are affected, as a matter of fact, all organs can be involved in inflammatory process, it is therefore wise to treat not only the joints, but take preventory steps as well such as IV glucocorticoids injections, to avoid organ damages.
2. RA can be cured - No, absolutely no, current recommended medications can only control the symptoms and slow down or even halt the progress of the disease.
3. It only has to do with genes - a rule of thumb for all auto-immune disease. There must always be 2 factors present at the same time for them to occur. First predisposition, for example genes, second, triggering factors, for example stresses, cigarette viral infections and other diseases.
4. It can only happen to women - wrong, ratio of women sufferers to men is 3:1, so, men are not spared from the disease even though it occurs more rarely.
5. Children cannot get Rheumatoid Arthritis - wrong, there is a specific form of RA in children and teenager, call Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis (JRA). What more alarming is that, JRA progress much faster that adult RA, and deformities occur at much younger age.
I have written a complete series of articles on Rheumatoid Arthritis, including self assessment, diagnosis criteria and treatments. Please have a look at the information for free starting from the introductory page at: http://www.squidoo.com/rheumatoid-arthritis-simple-explanations
