Living with Rheumatoid Arthritis

Description

Rheumatoid arthritis is a common autoimmune disease in which the body attacks itself, leading to joint inflammation and damage. Other organs can also be affected and further symptoms, such as fatigue and depression, can make this a miserable condition.
But knowledge can give you power over rheumatoid arthritis. In this book, Phillipa Pigache describes the nature and mechanism of the disease, including its causes, symptoms, diagnosis and treatment
Written in a clear and approachable style, Living with Rheumatoid Arthritis is a valuable and accessible aid to understanding and managing this condition.

Contents

• Introduction

Part 1 - About RA

• Rheumatoid arthritis: the who, where , why and what
• What goes wrong in rheumatoid arthritis?
• The course of RA is a bumpy road with blind turnings
• Diagnosing RA: a testing time
• Symptoms of RA: outside the joints

Part 2 - Treating and beating RA

• Rest and rehabilitation for inflamed joints
• Managing pain
• Drugs that change the course of the disease
• Bio-medicines that fine-tune the immune response
• Serious manifestations of RA and surgery

Part 3 - You and your future

• Dealing with your feelings
• Modifying your life-style
• Hope for the future

• Glossery
• Useful addresses
• Further reading
• Index

About the author

Phillipa Pigache has been a journalist and writer for more than thirty years, starting on local newspapers and women's magazines, moving to national newspapers, radio and television and more recently, becoming a freelance medical science writer. She has worked on the Sunday Times, Daily Mail and Guardian and for ITN and BBC science features
She started to specialize in writing about medicine chiefly because she was married to a doctor. (Her own educational background is in modern languages and the theatre). She has contributed to consumer health pages and journal for health professionals for twenty years and has won awards for her medical journalism and also for her fiction. She is currently the honorary secretary of the Medical Journalists' Association and editor of their journal, the MJA News.
She had written consumer health books on arthritis and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). She has two children, three grandchildren and three cats. She lives in Sussex and paints and gardens in her spare time.