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Osteoarthritis (OA) is a degenerative joint disease caused by joint wear and tear. The cartilage that cushions your joints continues to break off as you grow older, allowing the bones to rub together. Inflammation of the joints occurs as a result of the bone-on-bone joints.
The joints of your arms and legs, such as your fingers, wrists, knees, ankles, and hips, are the most often affected by OA.
OA pain may also originate in the lower back. If you’re having some of the early OA symptoms mentioned below, contact your doctor.
Pain
You’ve already used the sentence “Oh, my aching back.” You may have said it yourself. Aching backs, knees, hips, and neck pain are all too common among people with arthritis.
Early arthritis pain can be divided into two categories: pain and tenderness. When you move the affected joint in a certain manner, such as when opening a container with arthritic fingertips, you can experience sharper pain.
Tenderness
Tenderness is the pain you get when you press down on a joint. Visible swelling in the joint region may accompany tenderness, although this is more frequent in OA’s advanced stages.
Stiffness of the joints
Stiffness also goes hand in hand with knee joint pain. When you first wake up or sit at your desk all day, joint pain is expected. It’s also a sign of OA in its early stages. You can be tempted to return to bed because you experience a wooden sensation that makes you feel tired and heavy, but resist the temptation. When people with arthritis warm up their joints by gentle exercise or just about their everyday lives, they always feel better.
Strange feelings
Cartilage is designed to act as a shock absorber, allowing the joints to work freely. The bone-to-bone rubbing that occurs as the cartilage wears down can cause a variety of unusual sensations. Grating of the joints is very normal in OA patients. It’s the product of the bones grinding against each other. When you step, you can sometimes note or hear your joints popping or cracking.
Loss of flexibility
Loss of flexibility Loss in versatility, also known as the range of motion loss, can be exacerbated by joint discomfort and pain. Your joints’ range of motion refers to how much you can move them in their natural patterns. The range of motion of your leg, for example, is fully bending and extending it. You will not be able to bend your knee as much if you have arthritis. Flexibility loss is usually a slow and steady operation.
Your discomfort’s onset
In the early stages of osteoarthritis, pain, tenderness, and joint weakness are usually restricted to exact hours. After a basketball game, you could find that your hips hurt or that your back is sore first thing in the morning. However, when degenerative arthritis progresses, you can have achy joints even though you’re resting.