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Factors That Can Cause Arthritis

By Anthony Martin


Bone inflammation is a condition that manifests when one or more joints in the body experience stiffness and pains. This condition, also known as arthritis, is known to affect about 50 million people in America, who have been predisposed to the problem by several factors ranging from the modifiable ones to the non-modifiable ones. Some modifiable risk factors of this problem include physical inactivity, diet, obesity, smoking, occupation and joint injuries. Among the non-modifiable risk factors are hereditary, hormones, sex, and age.

Age is not a modifiable risk factor because one cannot control it. As long as one grows, there is every tendency that the joints would become stiff due to stress or prolonged inactivity. The cartilage also wears out as one grows up, leaving the bones to interact with each other thereby causing pain and inflammation.

Being a male or a female also says a lot about one's likeliness of having this bone inflammation. It has been discovered that more women have it than men. Statistics say that 64% of women have it more than the men. Of all the types of bone stiffness and inflammation that exist, only Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and gout are more common in men. The other forms of this condition are more pronounced in women.

Hormones, which are natural chemical substances in the body, have been discovered in clinical studies to be the major factor affecting the occurrence of this condition. As a result, about 70% of women suffer more of this than men. That means that if you are a woman, you are already naturally predisposed to suffering from the rheumatoid type than you would have been if you were a man.

Many health conditions are hereditary and the same applies to this one. The gene called human leukocyte antigen (HLA) can cause this problem when passed from one generation to another. Although there are many other causes of it, this particular gene is quite responsible for a number of well-known cases.

Modifiable risk factors refer to those ones that an individual can control. An example of modifiable factors is activity (or inactivity). This means that one can choose to be active or inactive, and the result of the decision taken can have an effect on the occurrence of this condition. If people are more active, the bones are more flexible and the problem will be less common.

If you know a person who has joint pains/inflammation and still consumes a lot of sodium salt, that person should be educated on the likeliness of worsening his or her condition. It is better for the person to avoid sodium salts and take more of water and fruits like bananas. Feeding plays a major role in determining if one will have the condition or not.

Smoking is also bad for the bones. It makes the condition to get worse and retards the healing processes of the bones. Even though the exact way this happens is not yet known, scientists are quite convinced that smoking does not help people with bone problems. It is therefore advisable to quit smoking in order to remain healthy.




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