Rheumatoid Arthritis Treatment: How to Cure Rheumatoid Arthritis Permanently

Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease where the immune system, which usually protects the body, mistakenly attacks healthy joints. It is a type of arthritis. This can lead to pain, swelling, and potentially severe joint damage over time. While there is no permanent cure for rheumatoid arthritis, understanding its mechanisms and exploring various treatment options can significantly help in managing its symptoms and slowing its progression.

Why Rheumatoid Arthritis Occur?

Rheumatoid arthritis manifests when the immune system, typically the defender against infections and diseases, mistakenly targets the body's tissues. Notably, RA usually appears symmetrically. 

For example, if one knee or hand is affected, the opposite will also be affected.

The exact reason your immune system begins to attack joint tissues remains unclear to medical experts. However, a sequence of events can trigger the onset of rheumatoid arthritis. ¹

• A combination of genetic predispositions and environmental triggers are the top causes of RA.
• The immune system may start reacting abnormally long before symptoms manifest.
• Although the autoimmune process can begin in different body parts, it predominantly affects the joints. It leads to inflammation in the synovium, or the joint's inner lining.
• Persistent inflammation causes the synovium to thicken, accumulating cells and proteins, which results in joint warmth, redness, and pain.
• As the disease progresses, the inflamed synovium invades deeper, destroying cartilage and bone within the joint.
• The joint capsule stretches, altering the joint's structure.
• The surrounding muscles, ligaments, and tendons weaken, reducing joint stability and function. This aggravates the pain and leads to further joint damage.

Now that you understand how it occurs, let's learn how to cure rheumatoid arthritis permanently or whether rheumatoid arthritis is curable or not.

Can Rheumatoid Arthritis Be Cured Permanently?

Understanding why rheumatoid arthritis occurs gives you half the idea about the treatment options ahead of you. 

If you are wondering how to cure rheumatoid arthritis permanently, we have to inform you that, unfortunately, there's no permanent cure for rheumatoid arthritis. 

It is possible to manage the disease and slow down the damage it causes to the body. However, severe damage may have already occurred in scenarios of delayed diagnosis. Doctors prescribe medications and exercises to suppress the symptoms of the disorder and attempt to slow down the damage it causes to our skeletal structure. However, no treatment can help someone get rid of RA completely.

Rheumatoid Arthritis Treatment

For a disease as life-invasive as rheumatoid arthritis, one would hope for the best treatment for rheumatoid arthritis as soon as possible. Unfortunately, there is no cure for rheumatoid arthritis. However, it is manageable with the help of various home remedies and medical treatments. We have discussed the best ones below. 

Home Remedies for Rheumatoid Arthritis

Most people look for home remedies before introducing the body to heavy medicines. Home remedies are kinder to the body and have fewer side effects. In some cases, they even provide parallel benefits. However, it is also crucial to understand that there is no effective home treatment for rheumatoid arthritis. But these remedies can bring relief from symptoms. 

The best course of action is to consult your doctor to understand which home remedies for rheumatoid arthritis would be best for you and if there are any limitations or precautions you must take.

Let's take a look at some of the home remedies for rheumatoid arthritis that are recommended for patients.

• Anti-inflammatory foods: Shorten your intake of irritating foods. Whether such foods irritate your gut, your skin, or any other part of your body, cut them out of your diet if you have evidence that a food is not helping your health. However, please make sure you do it under professional guidance. Foods like turmeric have anti-inflammatory properties, and research shows they can block proteins that cause inflammation and alleviate pain. Healthcare experts recommend a dosage of 1000 mg/day, but be sure to consult your doctor to tailor your dosage to your condition.  ⁵
• Exercises: Rheumatoid arthritis is a disease affecting the movement mechanisms of our body. Our joints and the associated tissues face damage and become less and less effective over time. For a longer duration, this disease may also lead to movement disabilities. The only solution is to employ the correct methods to slow down this damage. Exercising could lower swelling in your joints, and a combination of different exercise routines benefits your joints and heart health. You don't necessarily have to join a gym, as exercising can be done at home, making it one of the best home treatments for rheumatoid arthritis. However, the most crucial point to note is to ensure you take this approach under the guidance of a doctor or a physical therapist.
• Supplements: Keeping your body nourished with the required nutrients is a great way to ensure good health. However, supplements don't guarantee a cure or treatment. They should not replace your medicines, either. Moreover, some supplements may interfere with the prescribed treatments. So, only take supplements with a prior discussion with your doctor. One of the supplements allowed for RA patients is Omega-3 fish oil. When taken at a dosage of about 1000 mg twice a day, the supplement may help reduce inflammation. ⁶
• Acupuncture: It is an ancient technique known to cure many physical ailments. The remedy ensures good energy flows through the body while removing obstructions to correct energy imbalances. Practitioners use pressure points across the body to stimulate energy flow. Even though there is not a lot of scientific research to prove that acupuncture helps rheumatoid arthritis patients with symptoms, it can release endorphins. Endorphins are natural hormones that reduce pain. However, it won't decrease inflammation.  ⁷
• Massages: Some massages help stimulate the blood flow in our body, reduce swelling, and can also help release tension that builds up around the joints.  ⁸However, please consult your doctor first and pick a massage therapist with experience working with RA patients.

Home remedies for rheumatoid arthritis have their benefits and disadvantages. For a disease as complex as rheumatoid arthritis, it is crucial to consult a doctor before employing any of the home remedies. 

The biggest concern is possible interference with the prescribed medications. Some commonly used treatments have adverse side effects on the body. So, use them only in the allowed dosages. If a home remedy interferes with the effectiveness of the treatment, doctors may be required to prescribe higher doses of medications with a better impact. 

One of the red flags for any home remedy or supplement would be the label 'immunity booster.' As contradictory as it sounds, boosting the entire immune system for an RA patient may also mean amplifying the dysfunction of the system, as RA patients don't have a weak immune system but a dysfunctional one.

Rheumatoid Arthritis Treatments: Medical Options

Several medicines and treatments can help patients lead a normal life despite their struggle with rheumatoid arthritis. Your prescription may vary based on your symptoms and the duration for which you have had the disease. Let's take a look at some of the most commonly prescribed medications.

• Steroids: Steroids are used to reduce the inflammation and pain caused by rheumatoid arthritis. Doctors usually prescribe corticosteroids like prednisone to patients with rheumatoid arthritis⁹. The purpose is to slow down damage to the joints while treating the most interfering symptoms of the disease. However, there are prominent side effects of such medications. Some include- bone thinning, weight gain, and even diabetes. Due to the adverse side effects, doctors are very strategic about the use of corticosteroids. The idea is to utilise their pain-relieving abilities & then gradually reduce the dosage as the symptoms become more manageable via other treatments.  
• Conventional DMARDs: DMARDs stand for disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs. The purpose of these drugs is to slow down the progression of joint damage that rheumatoid arthritis can subject our joints to and also save other tissues from damage. They are medically called immunosuppressants or immunomodulators. DMARDs influence how your immune system behaves inside your body. They prevent the immune system from attacking healthy body parts and direct the immune response along the right pathway. They achieve this by working with individual immune system proteins separately. ¹⁰Some conventional DMARDs include methotrexate, leflunomide, hydroxychloroquine, and sulfasalazine. Despite being so intelligent with their functioning, these drugs trigger severe side effects like lung and liver damage. 
• Biologic Agents: Think of an intelligent treatment that knows what parts of your body to impact and which to spare. For readers who have just started researching rheumatoid arthritis treatment, it is noteworthy that most treatments for this condition are infamous for weakening the entire immune system. This gap led to the invention of biological agents—genetically engineered proteins that are smart enough to address the relevant parts of your body only.  ¹¹ This contemporary type of DMARD class includes medicines like abatacept, anakinra, certolizumab, etanercept, golimumab, adalimumab, infliximab, rituximab, sarilumab, and tocilizumab. These agents can further be divided into categories based on the types of cells they interact with. By far, biological agents are one of the most beneficial medications for RA since they prevent the development of disability over the long term without adverse effects on our bodies. However, they do have side effects.
• NSAIDs: Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, or NSAIDs, serve just the function that their name suggests. Their purpose is to reduce the pain and inflammation of RA patients without projecting the adverse effects of steroids on their bodies. These kinds of medications are not entirely free from side effects. Some of the common negative impacts include kidney damage, stomach irritation, and even heart problems. A few popular NSAIDs include ibuprofen and naproxen sodium. These are not very harsh on the body. You can get them without a prescription. However, the use of NSAIDs would require a prescription from the doctor. 
• Targeted Synthetic DMARDs: We have biological agents and conventional DMARDs, but what if they don't provide the relief you are looking for? It is when targeted synthetic DMARDs enter the picture.While conventional DMARDs broadly suppress the immune system, targeted DMARDs inhibit certain pathways within immune cells.  ¹²Some examples include baricitinib, tofacitinib, and upadacitinib. But there's a significant disadvantage to the use of these drugs. They may lead to grave conditions like blood clots, heart-related episodes, and even cancer. 

If you are wondering which treatment is best for rheumatoid arthritis from the ones mentioned above, an obvious answer would be the medications. Given the scale and speed of the damage inflicted by the disease, you need a quicker relief and management method. While there are many kinds of management options available to reduce the effects of RA, their effectiveness fades away with later detection of the disease. It is one of the many reasons we should seek medical help right at the onset of symptoms.

How Does Early Diagnosis Help in Prevention?

There is no cure for rheumatoid arthritis. If you have been diagnosed with the disease, you will likely have to deal with a lot of inflammation and pain around your joints. Your joints and associated tissues may also continue to endure damage throughout your life. 

However, managing the disease depends on how effectively you can slow down the impact of dysfunctional immune system responses. The best treatment for rheumatoid arthritis focuses on two things: reducing symptoms and slowing down the damage. 

Also, early diagnosis significantly aids in prevention by allowing timely implementation of interventions, including adjustments to the arthritis diet plan, to mitigate disease progression and complications.

If you happen to catch the disease years after its inception, you may have already done a lot of damage to prevent or delay a long-term disability. An early diagnosis is crucial because it helps you prevent significant damage. Get the rheumatoid arthritis test or arthritis profile test for quick disease detection if you spot any of the symptoms of RA.

Conclusion 

Our immunity guards us from harm. It is ironic and intimidating when the same system begins acting against us, causing more harm than benefits. Notably, your immune system is not fully dysfunctional in an autoimmune disorder. It will still work to protect you against pathogens, but it will also harm the parts of your body that seem like danger. 

Hence, taking immunity boosters is not prescribed for anyone diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder because the booster may also enhance the damage inflicted on your body. 

RA patients must check in with their doctor before they take a new supplement or use a home remedy. Even if you're seeking the best treatment for rheumatoid arthritis, you must know that they could seem complex. Avoid consuming substances that may interfere with ongoing treatments or reduce their effectiveness.