Osteoarthritis essays

Osteoarthritis essays The Pathophysiology of osteoarthritis is the affection of articular cartilage, along with the synovial fluid in the joint, permitting almost frictionless movement of joint bones at their points of contact. The frictional resistance of normal joints is the cartilage layer to absorb the shock associated with joint use. When weight is loaded onto the joint, the cartilage layer compresses. Once the weight is removed, the cartilage rebounds to its original dimensions. The articular cartilage is firmly attached to its underlying subchondral bone by a subchondral plate. This allows the subchondral plate to act as a shock absorber, which protects the joint from applied stresses. A thin layer of calcified cartilage separates the noncalcified or articular cartilage from its bony subchondral bed. The interface between the calcified cartilage and articular cartilage is known as the tidemark. The articular cartilage, with the subchondral bone and the surrounding skeletal muscles, supports even di stribution of weight loading across the entire joint structure. Osteoarthritis is a very common condition where the joints are affected by degeneration, often described as "wear and tear" arthritis. This can start from our early teens and gets worse as we grow older into adulthood. Wear and tear" does account for a large percentage of the problem, but there are many examples of people who have had very similar lives, one of whom will have virtually perfect joints, while the other will have really quite severe osteoarthritis. Thus there must be an inbuilt susceptibility in the protection against such disease. Symptoms in OA tend to get worse with activity, so that the end of the day is the worst time (in contrast to inflammatory arthritis). There may be hard, bony swelling of the joints, and a gritty feeling (or even noise) when the joint is moved (this is called crepitus). The symptoms of osteoarthritis are mainly pain, swe ...