Joints crack throughout the body: causes and possible diseases. What to do and when should you see a doctor? Where does osteoarthritis develop? Joint of a patient with severe osteoarthritis

Probably only the most lazy people I have never cracked my knuckles in my life. Those who use this method of relaxation have probably heard from their grandmothers predictions about the development of arthritis if you do not stop doing nonsense. What to do when joints crunch throughout the body, what are the causes of this condition, is pathology possible? Let's try to figure it out.

Each joint is held in place by a complex set of ligaments, tendons and muscles. The traditional explanation for why joints click is a change in pressure synovial fluid inside the joint. This difference occurs when the joint capsule is deformed - closed system filled with liquid.

Bubbles form and quickly disintegrate with a characteristic sound. This is why we cannot crack our fingers twice in a row, and it takes about twenty minutes to restore balance in the liquid. As for other sounds, they can be produced by damaged connective tissue.

There are the following reasons that lead to crunching in joints throughout the body:

• production of bone joints;
• accumulation of salt deposits in joints caused by poor nutrition, in a sedentary manner life, smoking, alcohol abuse, drug addiction;
• joint injury;
• violations in the structure;
• inflammatory processes in the adductor muscles;
• genetic predisposition.

Elbow joint

We determine whether or not there are characteristic sounds when pressing on the elbow. If there is discomfort and the elbow gets stuck in a bent state, then this may indicate problems with the cartilage. Crunching accompanied by numbness in the little finger and ring finger indicates the manifestation of compressed ulnar nerve syndrome in the cubital canal.

Shoulder

Clicking sounds in shoulder joint should be considered according to age. Before age 35, this may indicate joint instability. When moving, the rounded part of the bone comes out somewhat from the shoulder socket, which is accompanied by a loud crack.

In older people, if there is a crunch and pain when pressing on the joint, especially when the arms are above the head or behind the back, this indicates impingement syndrome of the greater tuberosity humerus and the process of the scapula - the acromion. In this case, inflammation of the tendons is also observed. In this case, any movement of the shoulder causes pain. Most likely, this is a manifestation of arthritis.

Ankle

Most loud noise The pain that the joint can produce is a rupture of the Achilles tendons. But often there is no noise, and only a moment later a feeling of heat appears in the back of the heel. Injuries from jerking can damage tendons with outside. The result will be a clicking sound every time you move your ankle. A sprain is characterized by a popping sound when the ankle joint is rotated.

Fingers

Experts refute the idea that when a person cracks his knuckles, this leads to arthritis. Research shows that crackers' joints are no more likely to develop arthritis than people who never do it.

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The most common noise is a squeaking sound when bending thumb towards the palm. The sound accompanied by sharp pain is a sign of arthritis. Bones rub against each other when the cartilage wears down.

Hip joint

Clicking in the hip joint is one of the most common complaints, especially among young women. This phenomenon is rarely accompanied by pain and does not cause concern. But in case of pain, we can talk about natural wear and tear or the onset of arthritis, so medical supervision is necessary.

Knee-joint

During squats, especially deep ones, the knee joint experiences a load that is 7-8 times the body weight. And if the process is accompanied by additional stress, the connective tissue begins to protest, cracking and clicking appears.

If there are painful sensations, then problems with cartilage are possible. If the crunch is inconsistent, there is reason to talk about age-related changes: When cartilage wears down, bones begin to rub against each other. Also, a crunch accompanied by pain may indicate the presence of inflammatory or degenerative changes characteristic of arthrosis.

snapping jaw

Some people experience jaw clicking. The cause may be subluxation, when the head is displaced from the joint capsule and returns to its place. If this is accompanied by pain, it may indicate the presence of dysfunction of the temporomandibular joint.

What to do?

The question of what to do if one day there is a crunching of the joints in the knees, clicking or creaking in any other joints, can arise before any person. The answer will be clear: if there is pain syndrome- you need to go to see a doctor.

The doctor will interview and conduct necessary research, will prescribe therapy. In some cases, reducing the load on the joint and using physical therapy will be sufficient, in others injections may be necessary. steroid drugs, surgical intervention up to the installation of a prosthesis.

What is meant by the statement “the joints wear out”? In order for us to walk, run and jump without feeling pain, the cartilage layer in the joints must be absolutely healthy, because it is responsible for the function of mutual sliding in the joints. The cartilaginous layer completely covers articular surfaces bones and prevents them from touching each other. For a number of reasons, cartilage can break down and wear away. This process, not accompanied by inflammation, is called arthrosis. The most common complaints are “The cartilage in the knee joint has worn away” and “The cartilage has worn away hip joint", and now we will explain why.

Why do joints wear out?

Throughout life, the legs bear a heavy load; when running or jumping, the joints take on a weight two to three times greater than the body weight of the “owner”. Everything has a limit, so by the age of 60, the cartilage in the joints becomes thinner and wears out. For some, it starts earlier, for example, women are more susceptible to the disease due to hormonal changes, athletes - due to intense loads, and people leading wrong image life, “kill” the joints junk food, alcohol or drugs.

What symptoms indicate that the cartilage has worn away?

• Joint pain bothers me when walking and becomes more intense over time.
• If arthrosis is not treated, it progresses, and the pain sometimes bothers you even at rest.
• It feels like the bones are rubbing against each other in the joint.
• When straightening, a crunching sound is heard.
• Swelling of the tissues over the joint.

Be careful! If the skin over the joint is hot or body temperature is elevated, the reason is not that the knee joints, this is not arthrosis. Most likely, you are faced with infectious arthritis or.

What to do if the knee joint is worn out or the joint in the hip is worn out?

Unfortunately, without resorting to surgery, it will not be possible to completely restore the cartilage surface, especially if the problem is faced by an elderly person, and not a young athlete, whose body is able to fight many diseases on its own, and even more so with the help of medications. But, despite this, it is necessary to treat arthrosis at any age: the disease does not go away on its own, but only develops, and moving around will become more and more difficult every day. Conservative therapy will help relieve pain, improve quality of life and slow down the destruction of the cartilage layer. You only need to contact an experienced orthopedic traumatologist: he will prescribe treatment aimed at improving mobility in the joint and completely eliminating pain.

Osteoarthritis is the most common joint disease. Previously, it was believed that this disease was associated with the aging process of the body. Indeed, with age, susceptibility to osteoarthritis increases, but, unfortunately, age is not the leading factor. Now osteoarthritis affects even relatively young people.

Osteoarthritis is called “the disease of worn-out joints,” and each of us faces this disease to one degree or another. But it is not all that bad. Most often, the disease manifests itself as mild pain or tenderness in one or more joints. Only in exceptional cases severe manifestations of osteoarthritis are observed, which threaten immobility.

What happens with osteoarthritis

Our joints are covered with cartilage, which softens loads and cushions the joints. Over time, the cartilage plate becomes thinner and can even completely dissolve. When moving, the joints begin to rub against each other. Pain and stiffness occur.
Our body strives to restore the absence cartilage tissue and builds bone. As a result, bone spurs appear, which over time lead to thickening and deformation of the joint. IN severe cases destruction of cartilage threatens complete immobility of the joint.

Manifestations of osteoarthritis

The main indicator of osteoarthritis is pain. At first it may not be strong, but at times painful. It occurs in the affected joints. The development of osteoarthritis is a slow process. Its manifestations can be minor or short-term, so, as a rule, they do not pay much attention to it.

The peak of pain most often occurs at the end of the day, when the joints are forced for a long time be in the same position. Bones rub against each other. And stiffness increases if a person remains motionless for a long time.

In severe cases of osteoarthritis, weakness of the muscles surrounding the affected joints develops, which impairs coordination of movements. A constant appears It's a dull pain, which reduces motor activity joint However, osteoarthritis rarely leads to complete immobility.

Advice!
If you have osteoarthritis, to relieve pain, try not to stay in one position for a long time, make movements every half hour.

Where does osteoarthritis develop?

Osteoarthritis most often affects the hands, spine, hip and knee joints. It all starts with the joints becoming swollen and red, and surprisingly, as the disease progresses, these symptoms disappear. Bone growths appear on the finger joints and stiffness appears.

Osteoarthritis often affects the spine. When cartilage is destroyed, the bone processes irritate the nerves coming from spinal cord To different parts bodies. Osteoarthritis especially often appears in the cervical and lumbar region spine. In addition, when the intervertebral discs wear out, compression of the nerves occurs, and this can cause severe pain- radiating pain ( discomfort not in the spine, but in the arm or leg) caused by irritation of the nerve leading to the limb.

The hip and knee joints are also susceptible to osteoarthritis because they bear significant load to support the body and wear out over time. Most often, osteoarthritis of the hip joint manifests itself as pain in the groin or in the inner surface of the thigh to the knee.

Symptoms of osteoarthritis
crunching in the joint when moving;
pain that occurs when starting to move and during exercise;
stiffness after immobility;
sudden, sharp pain in a joint during movement;
increased joint pain when the weather changes;
joint stiffness and deformity.

These symptoms cannot be ignored. The disease does not go away on its own; the condition will only get worse. The consequences of a frivolous attitude towards oneself can lead to disability and complete immobility.

"ARTRO-ACTIVE" in the treatment of osteoarthritis

At therapeutic treatment osteoarthritis apply various means, such as drugs NSAID groups, analgesics, antispasmodics. All of these remedies are effective, but long-term use may harm the body.

First of all, it suffers gastrointestinal tract And the cardiovascular system. Therefore, it is very important to minimize side effects and increase the effectiveness of treatment. The ARTRO-ACTIVE line helps with this - modern solution joint problems. The red line of drugs "ARTRO-ACTIVE" (balm and capsules) relieves inflammation and pain in the joints, allows you to reduce the dose of painkillers and anti-inflammatory drugs. As soon as the inflammation is removed, treatment continues with the blue line “ARTRO-ACTIVE” (tablets and cream). It rebuilds cartilage tissue, nourishes and strengthens the joint, and reduces the risk of exacerbations. All ARTRO-ACTIVE drugs have natural composition and don't call side effects even with long-term use. High efficiency ARTRO-ACTIVE drugs have been clinically proven in Russian research institutes.

Many shapes arthritis and related conditions damage the ligaments, muscles and/or bones and cause hip problems such as pain, stiffness and swelling.

Osteoarthritis. The most common form of arthritis, osteoarthritis is chronic illness, characterized by a fracture of the cartilage that cushions the ends of the bones where they meet and form joints.

In osteoarthritis of the hip, the cartilage covering the acetabulum and/or the surface of the head femur, breaks, causing the bones to rub against each other.

This leads to pain, immobility, stiffness and the formation of bony spurs called spurs. Pain from hip osteoarthritis is most often felt in the groin and front of the thigh areas.

Rheumatoid arthritis- chronic inflammatory disease, which appears when the immune system body, which usually protects against infections, mistakenly fights synovial membrane, a thin membrane covering the joints.

• pain,
• redness,
• swelling of the diseased hip joints.

Unexamined inflammation can lead to damage to the hip joint - disruption or impossibility of its functioning.

In addition to the hips rheumatoid arthritis also affects knees, hands, wrists, feet, ankles, elbows.

Juvenile arthritis is a term used to describe arthritis that occurs before age 16. There are several various types juvenile rheumatoid arthritis.

Ankylosing spondylitis- a form of arthritis that primarily affects the spine, causing inflammation that can lead to chronic pain and rigor of the spine.

Besides the spine, the hip is the joint most commonly affected by ankylosing spondylitis.

Lyme disease - infection, characterized skin rash, swollen joints and flu-like symptoms.

The disease is caused by a tick bite infected with the bacterium B.Burgdorferi. Lyme disease can have a negative impact on your hip health.

Lupus- chronic autoimmune disease, which causes the immune system to produce antibodies that attack and damage healthy tissue.

Lupus can cause inflammation of the joints, skin, heart, lungs and kidneys.

Gout- a form of arthritis that occurs when there is too much uric acid, products of body excretion circulating in the bloodstream, deposited in the form of needle-shaped crystals of monosodium urate in body tissues, including joints.

For many first symptom of gout- excruciating pain and swelling of the big toe, often due to injury (injury or illness).

Subsequent attacks may come and go periodically, primarily in the feet and knees. Less commonly, gout causes hip pain.

Arthritis affects both large and small joints.

Infectious arthritis. Known as " septic arthritis", infectious arthritis is a disease caused by infection in the joints.

Infectious arthritis is also often caused by bacteria spreading through the bloodstream to the joints. Sometimes it is caused by viruses or fungus.

Polymyalgia rheumatica. Inflammatory disorder Causing widespread muscle pain or muscle stiffness, polymyalgia rheumatica mainly affects the neck, arms up to the elbows, thighs and hip bones.

The disease often appears suddenly and disappears on its own after a year or two.

Osteonecrosis. Also called avascular or aseptic necrosis, this disease appears when a reduced amount of blood per part of the bone leads to its necrosis, and then complete destruction.

Blood flow can be blocked due to numerous reasons, including a blood clot, inflammation of a blood vessel, or corticosteroid medications. The hip is one of the most commonly affected joints.

Paget's disease - chronic disorder, at which severe fracture or the formation of bones causes them to become enlarged, deformed and weakened.

The disease rarely affects the entire skeleton, only one or a few bones. If the pelvis is susceptible to disease, the hips may hurt.

Sciatica- inflammation sciatic nerve. The biggest nerve in human body, sciatic, extends from the lower part of the spinal cord, through the buttocks, down the back of the leg to the foot.

The most common cases of sciatica include compression of the nerve, and as a result, the formation of a hernia intervertebral disc, or disruption of the structure that cushions the vertebrae.

The hip joints have cartilage tissue that prevents the bones from rubbing against each other. When the skeleton stops growing, the cartilage tissue stops forming and renewing itself. Over time, cartilage loses its elasticity and becomes thinner, which leads to bone friction (after 40 years). Then the symptoms of arthrosis of the hip joint appear. Right-sided coxarthrosis is more common.

Coxarthrosis gives the following symptoms:

• during physical activity, a person feels pain in the pelvis, a crunch appears;
• mobility of the lower body is limited: it is difficult to stand up, squat, sit on a chair, or raise a leg;
• gait changes, pain in the hip joint leads to limping;
• sharp pain that occurs when a piece of cartilage gets caught between adjacent bones.

The causes of coxarthrosis can be various injuries(fractures, bruises, dislocations), high load on the joint (typical for obesity and athletes), as well as:

• problems with the spine (kyphosis, scoliosis);
• If acetabulum and the pelvis were subject to fractures;
• rheumatoid arthritis, necrosis;
• poor circulation in the joint (due to improper or insufficient nutrition), metabolic disorders, hormonal imbalance;
• tumors (malignant and benign);
• fractures of the femoral neck and head;
• infections, joint inflammation;
• genetic predisposition;
• physical inactivity, age.

But still, coxarthrosis most often develops in old age and when blood circulation in the joint area is impaired.

Stages of disease development

Deforming arthrosis can occur in 3 stages:

1. Coxarthrosis 1st degree: pain in the pelvis appears only after prolonged physical activity. Having rested, the person feels well, the joint moves normally. If you take an x-ray of the hip bone at this time, you will notice a slight narrowing of the joint space.
2. The second stage of the disease: the pain makes itself felt after moderate load. Often radiates to the lower back, groin area, leg. A person begins to limp if he walks for a long time. The mobility of the hip joint decreases (both through pain and muscle weakness), it is difficult to remove. X-ray examination will show greater narrowing of the joint space.
3. At grade 3, pain appears during movement, at rest, and even at night. It is enough to move your leg or body to cause discomfort. The gluteal and hip muscles weaken, so a person may need a cane to get around. The position of the pelvis changes (frequent curvatures in right side), as a result the affected leg is shortened. In the picture you will see the virtual absence of a gap and significant bone growths.

Nowadays, it becomes a compelling reason to give a person disability due to coxarthrosis. But there are ways to avoid such a fate.

Treatment “without a knife”

Of course, it is better to diagnose coxarthrosis early. At the first and second stages, resorting to integrated methods, you can do without surgical intervention. The main thing is to develop blood circulation in the pelvis, widen the joint space, increase the nutrition of the cartilage, so that the condition of the hip joint itself improves. It is necessary to ensure that the pain when sliding the cartilaginous surfaces decreases.

In grade 1, therapeutic morning exercises are required; it promotes blood circulation and prevents synovial fluid (joint lubrication) from stagnating. There are a couple of rules to follow when performing exercises:

• movements are smooth, calm, not abrupt;
• self-massage in the hips and pelvis area - before and after exercise;
• baths will help relax your muscles, you can also do exercises there.

If the condition worsens from exercises, new pain appears, then they need to be changed to others.

At stage 1 coxarthrosis will also help drug therapy. Various painkillers (but they should not be abused), drugs that relieve inflammation (diclofenac, ketoprofen, meloxicam, etc.). We also need chondroprotectors - nutritional products for cartilage tissue, which contribute to the secretion of synovial fluid, partial restoration joint The disease should also be treated with muscle relaxants - they will relieve muscle spasms and improve blood circulation. Ointments and creams, even with the initial stage of the disease, bring only temporary relief.

Helps cure coxarthrosis various kinds physiotherapy: magnetic and laser therapy, ultrasound, phototherapy. The method of hardware traction is used, that is, traction of the hip joint. Using this method, the articular ends are separated, thereby reducing the load on the surface of the cartilage. Another way to cure grade 1 deforming arthrosis is massages. Here they practice traction of muscles and ligaments: when the patient tenses and relaxes a group of muscles, and the doctor stretches them. Also used manual therapy, but trust only experienced specialists.

During the healing process, follow a diet (to reduce the weight load on the hip joint) and go swimming.

No way without surgery

When a person develops coxarthrosis to degree 3, then alone therapeutic measures not enough. Articular cartilage already exhausted, the bones begin to rub against each other. Blood circulation is disrupted, metabolism in the joint slows down. Weakened muscles of the buttocks and thighs are unable to properly support body weight. Bone growths are visible on x-rays. There is terrible pain, even at night. At grade 3, the deformity of the hip joint is irreversible. Of course, all this prevents a person from functioning normally. Surgery required.

During the operation, the hip joint is replaced with an artificial one. This is endoprosthetics. The operation itself lasts relatively short - 1.5-3 hours. After it, the person will be able to walk after 3 days, first with crutches. Somewhere on the 10th day the patient is discharged. The prosthesis itself will serve you for 15 years or longer (it all depends on the quality of the prosthesis, on the “use” of the person, on the weight and mobility of the patient).

After endoprosthetics, you should not relax. You need to move to release joint lubrication, go on a diet (watch your weight, giving priority healthy food). Do not forget about exercises and procedures that increase blood circulation (massage, physiotherapy). You cannot lift weights or stand for long periods of time. And if you simply fulfill all these conditions, then you can significantly reduce the likelihood of developing coxarthrosis.

Be sure to consult your doctor before treating any illness. This will help take into account individual tolerance, confirm the diagnosis, ensure the correctness of treatment and exclude negative interactions drugs. If you use prescriptions without consulting your doctor, it is entirely at your own risk. All information on the site is presented for informational purposes and is not a medical aid. All responsibility for use lies with you.