Posted on November 20, 2007 in Arthritis Basics
Are you suffering from joint pain or inflammation in your joints and planning to visit your family doctor? Diagnosis of rheumatic diseases may be sometimes difficult as some of the symptoms are similar to various diseases. Your family doctor or general practitioner would assess your condition and might refer you to a rheumatologist or a specialized doctor.
For proper diagnosis the doctor may review your medical history, physical examination, laboratory test and X-ray reports. Your doctor may ask you to visit him more than once.
Here is the brief of the procedure and the steps involved in arthritis diagnosis:
Medical History: It is very important for the doctor to know your complete medical history, especially in case joint pain. You may need to answer the following questions asked by the doctor.
- Is the pain in one or more joints?
- When does the pain occur?
- How long does the pain last?
- When did you first notice the pain?
- What were you doing when you first noticed the pain?
- Does activity make the pain better or worse?
- Have you had any illnesses or accidents that may account for the pain?
- Is there a family history of any arthritis or rheumatic diseases?
- What medicine(s) are you taking?
It will be helpful for you if you maintain a diary that describes the pain, its occurrence time, its feel, for how long it lasts etc.
Physical Examination: The doctor will inspect your joints and would observe the redness, deformity, tenderness, warmth and ease of the joint movement. Some types of arthritis like lupus might affect other organs hence your complete physical examination may be done. Complete physical examination will include examination of eyes, ears, throat, nervous system, lungs, heart and abdomen.
Laboratory Tests: Laboratory tests may be conducted so as to confirm the diagnosis. For the laboratory tests samples of your blood, synovial fluid or urine may be required. Commonly used laboratory tests for arthritis diagnosis are given below.
- Antinuclear antibody (ANA): This test is conducted to check the blood levels of antibodies that are present in the connective tissue disease or autoimmune disease. These antibodies react with cells nucleus hence called as antinuclear antibodies (ANA).
- Arthrocentesis: This process is also known as joint aspiration and is performed to obtain synovial fluid sample. With the help of local anesthesia and hollow needle doctor obtains the synovial fluid sample. This test provides essential diagnostic information like presence of bacterial or viral infection or crystals in the joint.
- Complement: This test is conducted to measure the level of blood protein known as complement. These blood proteins destroy the foreign substances that come into your body. People who are suffering from lupus they have lower level complement blood level.
- Complete blood count (CBC): This test finds out the number of platelets, RBC and WBC present in blood sample. Some of the rheumatic conditions are related to yours CBC.
- Creatinine: This test is conducted to determine any kidney disease if you are suffering from rheumatic diseases.
- Erythrocyte Sedimentation Rate (ESR or sed rate): To detect inflammation in your body this blood test is conducted. Higher ESR shows that an inflammation is present in your body. ESR is typical for different types of arthritis.
- Hematocrit (PCV, packed cell volume): This test determines the number of RBC present in the blood sample. Generally people with rheumatic disease or inflammatory arthritis the number of RBC are low.
- Rheumatoid factor (RF): This test detects the presence of rheumatoid factor in your blood sample. RF is the antibody present in the blood of the people suffering from rheumatoid arthritis.
- Urinalysis: Urine sample is tested to detect red blood cell, white blood cell, protein or casts abnormalities. These abnormalities show the presence of kidney disease.
- White blood cell count (WBC): This test indicates the number of WBC present in the blood sample. Lower level of WBC indicates the higher risks to infection.
X-Rays and Other Imaging Procedures: They give the clear and exact picture of the affected joints. X-rays gives the picture of bones. They don’t include images of muscles, ligaments and cartilages. Other imaging procedures like computed tomography (CT), joint X-ray (arthrography) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) provides the clear picture of the joint.
Source: Healthlink
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