Healthy Living: Detecting Rheumatoid Arthritis - Northern Michigan's News Leader

Rheumatoid arthritis causes more than a million people to cringe in pain every day. 75-percent of those are women. There's no cure-but early diagnosis and treatment can keep people moving longer. Now there's a new way doctors can detect it even before the pain sets in. Robyn Haines has today's Healthy Living.

For 30 year old Robyn Nicols, the pain started at just two and a half years old. Robyn has had both of her knees replaced, her ankles fused and things are only getting worse. Rheumatoid arthritis or R.A. happens when the body's own immune cells attack healthy tissues, causing bone to painfully scrape against bone, at the joint.

Symptoms include joint pain, swelling, stiffness, restricted range of motion and extreme fatigue. To diagnose it, doctors use a variety of tests and x-rays. But now, a new blood test called Anti-CCP is giving doctors hope for early treatment.

The latest results show the blood test is correct 86 percent of the time. But some doctors argue the R.A. blood markers could be confused with markers for other autoimmune diseases such as lupus, psoriasis or even a viral infection. Still the test could give doctors the head start they need to treat R.A. before symptoms appear, and do it aggressively with a combo of drugs.