Who is a Rheumatologist?

Rheumatologists are doctors who treat patients suffering from any form of painful conditions of bone, muscle, joints, spine or the entire body. There are more than 300 rheumatological diseases which comes under the domain of rheumatology. Unfortunately, these diseases remain undiagnosed by doctors of other disciplines eg. Neurologist, Orthopedicians, General Physicians and Psychiatrists. There is a common disbelief that all painful diseases are neurological problems or orthopedic problem. Thus, most of these patients knock the doors of the neurologists and orthopedicians only to be mistreated and misguided by them. They are usually communicated that most of the problems are due to Vitamin D deficiency and Calcium deficiency. Even after consuming volumes of Calcium and Vitamin D pills, the patients keep on suffering and only when the diseases have resulted in severe complications like deformities or destruction, they come to the rheumatologists for opinion. People keep on searching for rheumatologist in Kolkata or rheumatologist in Delhi etc to look for a quality rheumatologist for salavage. In these situations, we hardly have any definite help for them.

Common diseases that are treated by rheumatologists are rheumatoid arthritis , Ankylosing Spondylitis, Psoriatic Arthritis, Osteoarthritis, Gout, Reactive Arthritis, Cervical Spondylosis, Lumbar Spondylosis, Prolapsed Intervertebral Disc, Lumbago, SLE, Dermatomyositis, Sjogrens Syndrome, Juvenile Imune Arthritis, Vasculitis, Scleroderma and so on.

What is Autoimmunity?

Most of the rheumatological diseases have a common causative phenomenon. This is called autoimmunity. Our normal immune system is designed to identify and destroy any foreign substance that enters the human body, either via mouth, nose, skin , intravenously or by any other natural orifices such as urinary tract etc. However, due to some known and unknown cause, in some people, the same protective immune system is misdirected against our own tissues. This causes damage of the healthy tissues even in absence of any preceding insult to the body. The immune system thinks that the normal healthy tissue is a foreign substance and considers it to be our body’s enemy and starts destroying the tissue. A very common and classical example is the common Hashimoto’s thyoiditis. Perhaps almost every other household have a family member who consumes medicines for thyroid disorder. The immune cells of the body start destroying the thyroid gland slowly there by reducing thyroid hormone supply to the body. These patients tend to gain weight and become obese with dry skin and interestingly this autoimmune hypothyroid disease is transmitted genetically.

More such autoimmune diseases are Rheumatoid Arthritis, SLE, Vasculitis, Scleroderma, Sjogren’s Syndrome, Inflammatory Myositis and so on. Unfortunately, apart from few, most of the autoimmune diseases are common in females. There has been quite a lot of research regarding this gender predilection of the rheumatological diseases but no definite reason has been ascertained yet.

When should you consult a rheumatologist?

Consult a rheumatologist if you or any of your acquintances are suffering from any of these symtpoms:

Are rheumatological diseases curable?

That’s the most asked question in my clinic. By the word cure we mean that the disease is treated with some medicines for a certain period of time and then stopped after the course of therapy is over and h disease does not recur. Unfortunately, this is not the case with mos of the rheumatological diseases. There are only a few rheumatological disease that can be cured. Few such examples are reactive arthritis and Henoch Scholen Purpura. But most of the disease like Rheumatoid Arthritis, SLE, Ankylosing Spondylitis need therapy for lifelong.

Final word:

Find a rheumatologist near you. If necessary, search in google to find a rheumatologist near your place or in the city. You can look for quality YouTube videos posted by many rheumatologists explaining and simplifying diseases. Most of the metropolitan cities have decent rheumatologists with good reputation. Have a consultation with a rheumatology doctor for any sign and symptoms as mentioned above. Get treated early. Most of the rheumatoloical diseases can be managed very well with normal quality of life when diagosed early and treated aggressively in the beginning.