The Window You Don’t Know You’re In: Stopping RA Joint Damage

Introduction to Early RA Treatment 0:00

Think of a room under our face like a fire in the house. If you catch it while it's just a small flame in a kitchen, you can put it out with a fired extinguisher. But if you wait, the structure of the how this cell begins to weaken and break down. I'm going to explain to you why putting out the fire early is the only way to stop permanent joint damage before it even starts. Hi Rheumatoid Arthritis Warrior, this is Dr. Ananda Subedi, your rheumatologist coach at the Roomed Up, as well as a practicing rheumeatologists here at Empower Artheritis and Rhematology Center.

Today, I'm going to talk about a very important aspect in rheuma arthritis, the importance of early treatment of rheumpatitis. So please stay with me. Before I go further, don't forget to like and subscribe to our channel. Please share our channels with other family members and other people who might be suffering from rheumatoid arthritis. Our content will help them learn more about RA to bring clarity. And also accept our gifts through our Channel that includes a free copy of the book, the Holistic Rheumata Arthritis Guidebook, as well as a FREE smoothie that you can prepare early morning to fight against inflammation of rheuma arthritis Now, let me start by saying that rheumatoid

Why Rheumatoid Arthritis Needs Urgent Care 1:14

arthritis is a chronic, systemic autoimmune disease. It affects multiple parts of our body, not just the joint. So, immediate action is very important in managing rheumiatoide arthritis. And this guide will help you learn why this is important. Why treatment early saves your joints. So here are the is and does for today and I'll be dividing this video into two parts. I will first go over some of the important aspects of why we need to manage rheumatoid arthritis early and aggressively. And in the subsequent video, I'l go some the holistic way of managing rheummatoids early.

Now, many of you who have rheumatoid arthritis, you might think that RA is just a joint disease, but you are not understanding the whole picture of rheuma. Rheumata is a systemic autoimmune disease and it has potential to cause damage in multiple areas, including your joints. Hence, I consider RA as an urgent disease where treatment is important early on. Now these are the facts that will help you understand why RA treatment needs to be urgent. Because RA is a destructive disease. it can cause joint damage and if there is a joint damaged it cause long term chronic joint pain and even disability.

So many of you who are suffering from RA you might be worried, am I going to get joint damages? But the fact is if we treat early then we can prevent susceptible joint damaging. but there's a risk. There's the risk of delayed treatment and if the treatment is delayed it can lead to irreversible joint damage and eventually leading to disability where

The Critical Window for Preventing Joint Damage 3:04

you are not able to use your joints either in your hand or the feet. But if you treat your RFIs early we can prevent such type of disability and joint damaged. And there's a time as well. There's critical time we call critical window. And it's the first three months after your diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis. Data suggests that if we treat rheuma arthritis early in the three month after onset of symptoms, the long term outcome is much better compared to delayed treatment. If we treated you aggressively with medication as lifestyle change in first 3 months, you can prevent your risk of having irreversible joint damage.

So always pay close attention to your symptoms, particularly the symptoms of joint pain, stiffness and you are not able to make a fist in your hand. Those are the early symptoms. And if you have those early, symptoms always get immediate medical attention. with your primary care doctor or a rheumatologist and they can help you understand the symptoms, make the diagnosis and treat you early. The treatment of Rheumatoid Arthritis has evolved in the last 20 years. Now we are fortunate to have so many treatment options.

And we are also fortunate to know a lot about other ways of managing rheumatoid arthritis beyond medications. But the medication are the cornerstone in managing Rheumataid Arthritis. So we call them disease-modifying anti-rheumaatic drugs. When you get the diagnosis, make sure you are starting your medication within the three months of your diagnosis because the delayed treatment can cause problem long-term. And if we treat early, we can even prevent the progression of the disease from mild rheumatoid arthritis to more severe, destructive form of rheuma arthritis.

So early aggressive start of DMAR is the key. And data also suggests if you treat earlier, you can prevent damage in almost 90% of patients with rheoma arthritis So there is a hope that need to treat

Treatment Goals and Remission 5:20

early we can prevent long term joint damage. And the benefit is also there and the other extra benefit of early intervention is it can dramatically improve your long-term quality of life. If you have RA if it is not well managed on time it, can lead to chronic pain which is due to joint damaged and if you've already developed joint damages we cannot reverse those damage and it can lead to long-term chronic pain, which is a challenging aspect in rheumatoid arthritis treatment when it is not managed on time.

But the good news is, we have a good roadmap on how we manage rheumpatitis and the road starts with accurate diagnosis. Now, as I have discussed in the earlier videos, joint pain could come from so many other different conditions. It is not always rheumatoid arthritis. So, it's very important for you to discuss with your primary care doctor as well as your rheometologist to come up with the accurate diagnosis of rheo. After that start your tailored intervention. Depending on your stage of rheumatoid arthritis, depending on the severity and your other medical conditions, your doctor can guide you what might be the right option for you.

They will start you on a long term treatment plan. There is a goal of achieving remission. which is a term we use when your symptoms are minimal. There is no signs of inflammation when a provider or the doctor is examining your joints and your blood markers also come back normal, such as C-reactive protein and sedimentation rate. and we call that remission and in rheumatoid arthritis treatment that is our goal. Our goal is to get you to remissions sooner the better and with the treatment we have so far we can achieve remisssion and also don't forget the role of holistic uproads which includes medication along with other lifestyle interventions that includes healthy eating, regular gentle exercises, and overall maintaining your mental health and sleep.

And the reason is holistic approach works better, not just the medications. Now, as I mentioned earlier, we have to have some goal in how we manage rheumatoid arthritis from the start to the finish line. At the start line, when you are initially diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, always ask your doctors. Ask your rheumeatologist. What is our goal? Where are we heading? And have a clear map, clear a map of your roadway so that you know where you're going. And always aim for remission.

Medication Options and Monitoring 8:12

That is your goal in rheuma to arthritis treatment. Now, as I mentioned earlier, Unfortunately, you have got rheumatoid arthritis but you got the arthritis at the right time where we have more than 10 FDA approved drugs in managing rheuptoid. There are so many treatment options but most of the time, most people do start with methotrexate and this is a reasonably effective and reasonably safe medication to treat rheo. When methotrex is not doing enough, then we can combine them with other medications, including early use of glucocorticoids, such as steroids or prednisone.

And this glucoricoid helps you manage your rheumatoid arthritis a little bit earlier, till the DMR, the disease-modifying antibiotic drug, is still not working. The disease-modifying antibiotic drug typically takes a couple of weeks to be effective. So we need to bridge that time with glucocorticoid or steroid to help you manage your symptoms. And if your disease is mild, your doctor might choose other medications such as hydroxychloroquine or Plaquenil or sulfasalazine could be other options. We can combine them together to effectively manage rheumatoid arthritis.

All of you rheumatoid arthritis warriors, hope you are understanding this video and I hope that you're learning about why it is so important to treat rheuma arthritis early and aggressively with a holistic approach. If you like the video, please give us a thumbs up and please share this with your loved one who might benefit from the information about rheoma arthritis. And also don't forget to accept our gift that includes the Holistic Rheumatoid Arthritis Guidebook as well as a recipe of a smoothie that you can prepare in the morning to fight against inflammation.

Now, let me also reiterate one more time the importance of setting goals in rheumatitis. unless we have goal, we cannot achieve those goals. So that's why we always need to have a goal on how and why do we manage rheumatoid arthritis. As I mentioned earlier, our goal in RA treatment is remission or low disease activity. Now, ideally, if you have rheummatoide arthritis, you need achieve this goal by six months. and that can help minimize your long-term joint damage. And when we are on this path of remission, when you are in this road to achieve remissions, we always need to have a regular follow-up with your doctors.

Regular blood tests, regular monitoring by your doctor so that we can understand early on how your joints are doing and most important, whether those medications are causing any problem or not because side effect prevention is an important part and parcel of treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. So your doctor need to closely monitor your symptoms as well as blood tests to understand if there are any side effects with those medication. Now, all of you rheumatoid arthritis warriors, thank you so much for watching this video.

We quickly discuss about why it is so important to treat rheuma to arthritis early and overall the goal is to cheat aggressively early with holistic approach that includes medication as well as lifestyle intervention. And if we can aggressively treat early, we Can prevent long term joint damage, minimize pain and improve your function. Now, I'll discuss more about this topic in the next video. Till that time, please like and subscribe our channel and share this content with other people who might be suffering from rheumatoid arthritis.

And I will see you in next videos. Bye bye.