Medical Questions » Psoriasis Questions » Question No. 824
Question:I have had psoriasis for years, and now I' m getting bad arthritis. I' m told there is a connection—is this so?
Answer:Arthritis means ' a painful joint' and nothing more. It is important in any patient with arthritis to determine the type of arthritis present. One fairly uncommon type of arthritis is psoriatic arthritis, in which the lining of the joint is affected in the same way as the skin in patients with psoriasis. Psoriasis is a distressing skin disease which causes red, scaling, unsightly patches to occur in many parts of the body. The disease will wax and wane over the years, but usually slowly worsens in most patients, but some find it suddenly disappears. The arthritis that may accompany the skin disease is treated in the same way as osteoarthritis, with the addition of medication to control the psoriasis. A relatively new drug called Etretinate appears to be effective in both the skin and arthritis forms of the disease. In your case, it may or may not be psoriatic arthritis. If your skin disease is not active, it is unlikely that the arthritis is due to psoriasis. The only way to find out for sure is to have an orthopaedic specialist remove some fluid from the joint for examination by a pathologist—this can give a definite diagnosis.
       
eXTReMe Tracker