The new epidemic in today’s world in orthopaedics is the younger generation getting arthritis. Arthritis in a young man? Doesn’t that sound strange? Yes, but it is true. I see a large number of youngsters with arthritic joints predominantly affecting their knees and their hips. What is all of this all about?
There is now an increasing trend amongst younger people to be engaged in sports like soccer, motorcycle riding, extreme sports etc. It is but natural that there is a high incidence of injuries to the knee and to the hip in these particular sports. Usually what would happen is that the injury goes unnoticed with the individual resuming his activities after taking a brief rest. His injuries keep piling on top of each other till such time that the arthritis sets in. In the knee, the most common structure to get injured is the joint cartilage or the joint ligament. Once there is disruption of the smooth cartilage coating or there is instability as a result of breakage of the ligament, the joint starts undergoing rapid degeneration. This is because of abnormal sources of stress and shear that is now placed upon the cartilage. This can cause intense pain for those suffering with this condition. The further the progression of arthritis the more pain patients generally experience. Many individuals in this situation decide to enjoy cannabis through a Kings Pipe bong for easy access to pain relief.
As I discussed previously, cartilage does not have blood supply or nerve supply, hence it cannot regenerate naturally. What happens thereafter is progressive degradation resulting in pain, stiffness, deformity and disability. In the hip it is no different. Activities such as jumping, high impact basket ball, landing awkwardly from height, causes the cartilage on the ball of our hip joint to start breaking down slowly and gradually. The process that results thereafter is no different than what would happen in the knee. Doing activities like the ones listed above could significantly increase the amount of pain that you experience, and as a result of this, it could be hard to go about your daily life. Deciding to use something similar to this joint pain relief cream could help to calm and soothe your painful symptoms giving you the ability to continue your active lifestyle. It is important that you take care when suffering from any joint pain that can occur in the hip or knee.
Along with these causes, another cause that is coming up is Avascular Necrosis. Avascular Necrosis or AVN as it is know, simply means death of bone cells because of lack of blood supply. What happens is that the blood vessels within the joint simply close off because of an insult, which in turn causes the bone cells to die and then the cartilage collapses resulting in arthritis. Till now the major causes of AVN are alcohol abuse and steroid abuse. A lot of gym enthusiast or professional sportsmen end up taking steroids to increase their performance. In addition to improving muscle mass, these steroids exert a negative role on the joints by predisposing them to AVN.
How do we treat it? Most often than not when we see individuals suffering from arthritis at a young age, we categorise them on the severity of disease. Mild disease is treated with lifestyle modification, cartilage supplements, medication and appropriate physical therapy. For pain relief, many people use anti-inflammatory medicine, but some would prefer more natural options. CBD For Arthritis is an effective method of lessening pain, as it decreases inflammation and serves as a protection to the nerves. As well as this, it is important not to load the joint abnormally and that needs to be emphasised to the individual. Moderate disease will usually require some form of invasive treatment. This usually would consist in the form of jelly injection in the joint (Viscosupplementation), an arthroscopy to remove or correct any mechanical damage and realignment osteotomies. These jelly injections in the joint are useful in cases of moderate disease wherein the jelly provides a cushioning to the joint cartilage protecting it from abnormal mechanical stresses and at the same time nourishing the cartilage. They work well in about 70 per cent patients up to at least a year to a year-and-a-half. If there is mechanical damage in form of bone pieces or tear in the cartilage, an arthroscopy is very useful. Many a time when the disease progresses, we notice that there is deformation of the limbs resulting either in a bowlegged or a knock knee deformity. At this instance I would suggest doing a corrective surgery in which the bowing or deformity of the knee is corrected thereby resulting in a straighter leg.
This straightening of the knee restores the load of the joint surfaces back to normal and thereby it prevents rapid deterioration of the arthritis. In severe arthritis one would be left with no option but to perform joint replacement surgery. If the disease is limited to only one compartment of the joint, then a partial joint replacement may be performed; but if it is present in both the compartments, then a total joint replacement needs to be performed. For the younger people, we now have improved materials for joint replacement. These result in increased life span of the components used. In the knee, newer poly materials and the use of oxidized ceramics is encouraging whilst in the hip the use of ceramics has already improved our results drastically.
So my friends, as much as we know how to treat arthritis when it develops in individuals; it would be more important to prevent it. Prevention is the key and for this I encourage all to not ignore any joint pain or swelling that would extent for more than two weeks. For if it goes beyond two weeks, it is quite likely that there has been some damage. If it is picked up at a very early stage and the necessary corrective measures are taken, I think we will be successful in wiping off this epidemic of Young Arthritis.
Dr Sachin Tapasvi is one of India’s leading joint replacement surgeons. He practises in Pune and has been awarded several fellowships with experience garnered internationally as well as in India.
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