Why do joints hurt? With such questions, a large number of patients go to the doctor or try to find answers on their own. Unfortunately, these complaints are not specific and may indicate pathology with various mechanisms and causes of development.
We will try to identify the most common causes of joint pain and find out how to treat common ailments.
symptoms
Before studying the immediate cause of pain, it is beneficial to know more specifically about the symptoms of diseases of the musculoskeletal system. The doctor, starting a diagnostic search, will find out exactly how the joint hurts - so the specialist will quickly find the cause of the disease.
By the nature of sensation, pain can:
- heartache.
- Cutting.
- Meletop.
- Compressed.
Pain in the joints of the arms and legs varies in intensity. Painful, mild pain indicates a chronic disease. If the joint is severely sore, the sensation does not make it possible to make movements, then the process is acute.
The rhythm of pain
The symptoms of all diseases of the joints of the arms and legs can be divided according to the rhythm of pain: mechanical or inflammatory. Mechanical pain has the following characteristics:
- Increased in the evening.
- Morning stiffness is not typical.
- Very felt after doing physical exercise.
- During rest, the pain aches or disappears completely.
- Start - a certain type of pain at the time of onset of movement.
Inflammatory rhythms are characteristic of synovitis of the joints of the arms and legs of various origins. The symptoms are as follows:
- Morning stiffness of the body or parts of the arms and legs for more than 30 minutes.
- The pain increases at night and in the early morning.
- With movement, the symptoms become less intense, the stiffness of the body decreases.
- In this rhythm of pain due to cramps and body aches, anti-inflammatory drugs work well.
Other symptoms
Pain in the joints of the arms and legs, depending on the cause of development, is accompanied by certain manifestations. Why joint pain occurs can often be determined by additional symptoms:
- Limited movement of the hands or feet.
- Limb stiffness.
- Swelling of the arm and leg joints (swelling of the elbow joints).
- Local fever and redness of the skin.
- General weakness, fever.
- Visible skin lesions on arms, legs, torso.
- Manifestations from other organs.
Depending on the symptoms that accompany the pain in the joints of the arms and legs, the doctor will determine why the disease arose.
Joint disease
Pain in the joints of the arms and legs can be caused by diseases that are completely different in terms of origin and mechanism of development. However, the most common causes of such symptoms can be identified:
- Osteoarthritis is a degenerative disease of cartilage and bone tissue. Pain in the joints is mechanical, during periods of exacerbation, the inflammatory components merge.
- Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease associated with joint attack by the body’s own immune system cells. Joint pain has a clear inflammatory rhythm.
- Reactive arthritis is inflammation caused by infection in other organs. Often occurs with hepatitis and urinary tract infections.
- Infectious arthritis - is associated with the entry of microbes into the joints.
- Injuries and fractures. Diagnosis is not difficult due to the presence of trauma in history.
- Damage to ligaments and intra-articular formation. The soft structure of the joint also causes joint pain when damaged.
- Rheumatic diseases. A large group of causes that cause autoimmune damage to the joints: systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatism, Bechterew's disease, Reiter's syndrome and others.
- Gout and other metabolic arthropathy. Often, symptoms of damage to the musculoskeletal system are associated with the deposition of various pathological substances in the joints. In gout, it is a salt of uric acid.
- Psoriatic arthritis - the cause of this disease is unknown. The body’s own antibodies affect joint tissues, internal organs and skin. A frequent manifestation of the disease is dermatitis - peeling of the skin on the extensor surface of the limbs.
This list represents the most common causes of diseases of the musculoskeletal system.
Joint pain can also be caused by vascular disorders and nerve disease. The treating physician must determine the final cause.
Knee joint disease
Knee pain is one of the most frequently reported complaints to rheumatologists. Why does the knee hurt? These elements of the musculoskeletal system daily withstand large loads throughout the body, perform a variety of movements and have complex structures.
The knee joint is sore with various diseases, some of them have been listed above, others are specific to this joint.
"Sick knee: how to get rid of it? "- First of all, seek medical advice. Instrumental diagnostics help to find out why the knee hurts, but a presumptive diagnosis is made based on complaints and examinations.
Pain in the knee joint most often occurs for the following reasons:
- Gonarthrosis - osteoarthritis of the knee joint. This cause is the most common mechanism for knee pain. Articulation is subject to daily load, which is a major risk factor for arthrosis.
- Meniscopathy. The menisci are a layer of cartilage inside the joints. When a knee injury occurs, it is this structure that is often damaged. Aching joints with severe meniscopathy, pain occurs when you try to move. Pathological treatment is operative.
- Arthritis of various origins. Pain in the knee joint with arthritis is inflammatory in nature, it may be associated with infection in the joint itself or other organs. Pain in the knee joint can also occur with rheumatoid arthritis and other autoimmune diseases.
- Gout. The knee joint is not the most common localization of gouty arthritis. But these joints can still be affected by the disease. Pain in the knee is accompanied by the presence of subcutaneous tophi, increased levels of uric acid in the blood.
- Inflammation of tendons - tendonitis. Pain in the knee joint is often associated with soft tissue damage. When microtrauma occurs to a tendon or ligament, pain occurs in the knee, it is associated with a local inflammatory response. Symptoms worsen with exercise.
- Circulatory disorders. Vascular thrombosis, thrombophlebitis, varicose veins can cause pain in the knee. This problem often occurs in menopausal women, as well as in people who often load the joints.
- Baker's cyst and other diseases of the articular bag. The knee joint has a complex structure, its synovial membrane has inversions and pockets. Pain in the knee can be caused by local inflammation of the joint capsule or accumulation of inflammatory fluid in the popliteal space.
- Tumor. Neoplasms rarely affect the articulatory area. Often, pain in the knee associated with tumor growth occurs when metastases from other organs are present in the joint. In this case, the diagnosis is known, and treatment has been carried out for oncology.
With this disease and others, a person's knee hurts, what to do in a particular situation, the attending doctor will tell you.
Knee pain is not always a sign of serious pathology, but worrying about your health is not excessive.
Diagnostics
Before prescribing treatment for joint pain, the doctor needs to make a final diagnosis. To do this, he or she will perform a number of mandatory diagnostic procedures. Examination standards include:
- General analysis of blood and urine - will indicate the presence or absence of inflammatory reactions.
- Biochemical blood tests - assess liver and kidney function, state of protein, fat and carbohydrate metabolism.
- X-ray of the affected joint. X-rays are performed in several projections and allow you to detect bone pathology.
Unfortunately, in most cases, these research methods are not sufficient to make a diagnosis. In this case, additional methods are used:
- Computed tomography - allows you to detect even the smallest damage to bone tissue.
- Magnetic resonance imaging - this method perfectly describes all soft tissues, including ligaments and meniscus, tumors, cysts and other pathological formations.
- Ultrasound of the joints - detects the pathological formation of the stomach and solids, can measure the speed of blood flow in the vessels.
- Arthroscopy is the introduction of a camera into a joint cavity. One of the most accurate research methods.
- Diagnostic puncture - fluid is taken from the articulatory cavity into a syringe, which is subject to examination.
This diagnostic tool allows you to make a correct diagnosis with high probability. Many procedures are expensive or have contraindications, so the need for research is determined individually.
Treatment
How to Treat Joints? For joint pain, there are a large number of folk remedies, techniques and recipes. The attending physician will help you choose the right method of therapy.
All means and methods of therapeutic effect can be divided into several groups, each of which will be discussed below.
Drug treatment
For joint pain, medications are often used exclusively. This is not the right approach, it is better to use complex treatments. However, where drugs play an important role.
The most commonly used medications:
- Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs.
- Non -narcotic and opioid analgesics.
- Relax your muscles.
- Glucocorticosteroids.
- Chondroprotectors.
- Cytostatic.
- vitamin.
Of what each particular medication helps, the treating physician should explain it to the patient.
In vascular disease, other drugs are prescribed. If you have a disease of the lower leg canal and at the same time a sore leg joint, what to do and which treatment to choose, the attending physician decides.
Physiotherapy
The use of various physiotherapeutic procedures complements medical treatment.
The following techniques help with joint pain:
- Electrophoresis.
- Phonophoresis.
- Acupuncture.
- Paraffin application.
- Rodon took a shower.
- Mud therapy.
- Magnetotherapy.
These and other techniques allow you to increase blood flow to the affected joints, relieve swelling, and increase the intensity of metabolic processes.
Therapeutic immobilization
For joint pain in the acute period, therapeutic immobilization is often prescribed. This method involves the application of bandages, corsets and orthoses to the affected joint.
You can not use the bandage for a long time, because the muscles under the orthotic design atrophy from inactive. However, during heavy loads, support from a crippling product is very useful.
exercise therapy
Physical therapy plays an important role in the treatment of any pathological process in the musculoskeletal system. Gymnastics allows you to adjust the joints to the load, restore muscle strength, improve blood circulation and relieve swelling.
The intensity, timing of exercise largely depends on the nature and severity of the disease. You need to start the workout with breathing exercises and warming up the small muscles.
Morning exercise for 20-30 minutes a day should be supplemented with swimming, Nordic walking and other aerobic activities.
massage
The massage procedure perfectly relieves the patient from joint pain. What massage methods are used? The procedure improves blood circulation, relieves swelling, reduces pain. You need to entrust the implementation of this procedure to a specialist and undergo a massage after performing a set of exercises.
Surgery
The key, and sometimes the only, role in the treatment of articular pathology is surgical intervention. Therefore, as a result of injury, the degree of severe degenerative disease, complications of articular pathology are treated.
Surgery can be performed in a variety of volumes: from plastics to prosthetics of affected joints. Indications for intervention are determined by the physician treating the patient along with a surgeon or traumatologist.
Treatment with folk remedies
Traditional medical recipes are still popular in our country. It should be said that treatment with folk remedies is not a proven and proven method, and is used by patients at their own peril and risk.
For the treatment of pathology of the musculoskeletal system, the following folk remedies are used:
- Compressed from bay leaves and cabbage.
- Boil sunflower roots.
- Ointment from a golden mustache.
- Spread in the eggshell.
- Compressed from crushed chestnuts.
- Rye grains and other grain structures in the form of decoctions.
- boiled rice.
- Baking powder.
If you decide to use one of the traditional medicine recipes, consult your doctor first.