Have you got The S Factor?

• Stiffness - Early morning joint stiffness lasting more than 30 minutes

• Swelling - Persistent swelling of one joint or more,especially hand joints

• Squeezing - Squeezing the joints is painful in inflammatory arthritis

The following poster is part of a public awareness campaign developed by the Rheumatology Futures Project Group* (RFPG – Ailsa Bosworth, CEO of NRAS is Joint Chair of the RFPG) and endorsed and supported by Arthritis Research UK, the Royal College of GPs and The Primary Care Rheumatology Society.

If you have any symptoms highlighted in the poster which might possibly relate to rheumatoid arthritis, then seek help from your GP, don’t delay.

The RFPG are also hoping for Department of Health backing for this campaign which was one of the key recommendations in the National Audit Office Report published in July 2009.

If you are willing to take one of these posters to display in your GP surgery, your library, local pharmacy or any other public place, please download the poster to print off or please contact us and we’ll send you some.

Please also watch the NRAS Video about Early Diagnosis - a quick diagnosis can make a real difference.

What is RA?

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic, progressive and disabling auto-immune disease affecting approximately 690,000 people in the UK adult population.

It is a disease in which the immune system attacks the tissue within the joint, leaving it painful and inflamed. If left untreated, the joint can lose its shape and alignment, and can eventually become unstable and ultimately, completely destroyed.

It is a painful condition, and can lead to disability (this varies between individuals and depends on how severe/aggressive the disease is) and ultimately can affect a person’s ability to carry out activities of daily living.

The disease can progress very rapidly (again the speed of progression varies widely between individuals) or more slowly, causing swelling and damaging cartilage and bone around the joints.

Any joint may be affected but it is commonly the hands, feet and wrists. It is a systemic disease which means that it doesn’t just affect joints, it can affect the whole body and internal organs (although this is not the case for everyone with RA) such as the lungs, heart and eyes.

It affects approximately three times more women than men and onset is generally between 40 - 60 years of age although it can occur at any age. There are around 15,000 children under the age of 16 with the juvenile form of the disease. We do not know what causes it although various ideas include environmental triggers such as virus, infection, stress, trauma have been suggested. Cigarette smoking is an important precipitating factor.

Furthermore, smoking makes the outlook for the RA worse. So far, we cannot cure it, but we now understand much more about the inflammatory process and how to manage it. RA is a lot more common than leukaemia and multiple sclerosis.

However, because RA and its effects are not well publicised, awareness of the severity of the condition tends to be restricted to those who are directly affected or their carers and relatives.

The good news is that the prognosis today, if diagnosed and treated early, is significantly better than it was 20-30 years ago and many people have a much better quality of life in spite of having RA.

RA is economically costly. In fact the economic burden of RA in terms of loss of productivity amounts to £8 billion1. We now know that uncontrolled RA increases mortality through an increased risk of cardiovascular disease such as heart attacks and strokes; again the need for early treatment is imperative.


Reference:

   1. National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, Economic Burden of RA Report, 2010


*The Rheumatology Futures Project Group is (RFPG) is a coalition of patient and professional organisations representing the entire rheumatology community (primary care, secondary care, consultants, GPs, nurses and allied health professionals, patient organisations) and the pharmaceutical industry. The RFPG was specifically formed in 2007 to develop and execute a collaborative and clearly‐defined programme of work to identify barriers to providing high‐quality rheumatology services for people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) across England, and to explore what high quality care should look like and how it could be delivered and was limited to a three year, time limited project which ends summer 2010.

If this information has helped you, please help us by making a donation. Thank you.