What is the difference between rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis?

When people reach a certain age, they will always suffer from various diseases. In addition to the most common cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, there are also rheumatic diseases. So what is the difference between rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis?

Difference between rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis

Rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis are currently the simple names for rheumatic arthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. From the perspective of Western medicine, rheumatic arthritis and rheumatoid arthritis are two cold inflammatory lesions. We simply explain that rheumatic arthritis is milder, with systemic migratory pain as the main symptom, and the joints have no morphological changes; in addition to pain, rheumatoid arthritis also has swelling, joint stiffness, soft tissue contraction, limited joint movement and joint deformity, which is much more serious than rheumatic arthritis. Although the two have the same cause, the pathological mechanism, clinical symptoms and even treatment are not exactly the same.

Rheumatoid arthritis

1. It is an allergic orthopedic disease and one of the main manifestations of rheumatic fever. It usually starts with acute fever and joint pain. The typical manifestation is mild or moderate fever, migratory polyarthritis, and the affected joints are mostly large joints such as knees, ankles, shoulders, elbows, and wrists. It is common to transfer from one joint to another. The lesions are red, swollen, burning, and painful. Some patients also have several joints at the same time. Atypical patients only have joint pain without other inflammatory manifestations. Acute inflammation generally subsides in 2-4 weeks without leaving sequelae, but it often recurs. If rheumatic activity affects the heart, myocarditis may occur, and even heart valve disease may be left behind.

2. The etiology of rheumatic arthritis is not yet fully understood. Based on the analysis of symptoms, epidemiology and immunology, it is believed to be closely related to hemolytic streptococcal infection in the human body. It is currently noted that viral infection also has a certain relationship with this disease.

Rheumatoid arthritis

1. It is a chronic systemic autoimmune disease characterized by synovitis of the joints. Long-term and recurrent synovitis can lead to the destruction of cartilage and bone in the joints, joint dysfunction, and even disability. Vasculitis lesions affect all organs of the body, so this disease is also called rheumatoid arthritis.

2. Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic systemic inflammatory disease with an unknown etiology. It is characterized by chronic, symmetrical, multiple synovial arthritis and extra-articular lesions as the main clinical manifestations. It is an autoimmune inflammatory disease. The disease is prone to small joints such as the hands, wrists, and feet, with repeated attacks and symmetrical distribution. In the early stage, there are redness, swelling, heat, pain and dysfunction of the joints. In the late stage, the joints may show varying degrees of stiffness and deformity, accompanied by atrophy of bones and skeletal muscles, which can easily lead to disability. From the perspective of pathological changes, rheumatoid arthritis is a widespread inflammatory disease that mainly affects the synovium of the joints (later it may affect the articular cartilage, bone tissue, ligaments and myotomes), followed by connective tissues such as the serosa, heart, lungs and eyes. In addition to joint lesions, systemic manifestations of rheumatoid arthritis include fever, fatigue, pericarditis, subcutaneous nodules, pleurisy, arteritis, peripheral neuropathy, etc. In a broad sense, rheumatoid arthritis includes not only inflammatory lesions in the joints, but also widespread systemic diseases.