Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) affects about 1.3 million Americans. Rheumatoid arthritis symptoms are caused by inflammation, which is the body's normal response to a foreign invader like a virus or bacteria. But in RA, the cause of the inflammation is still not fully understood.
"I tell people that rheumatoid arthritis is caused by something we can't define that gets into a joint. The body tries to kill it off with inflammation, but it can't," says Gerald S. Harris, MD, a rheumatologist at the Lahey Clinic in Arlington, Mass. “That ‘something’ then spreads to other joints. We know that genes have something to do with rheumatoid arthritis inflammation, but there are still other factors we don't completely understand.”
To read the rest of the article: http://www.everydayhealth.com/health-report/understanding-rheumatoid-arthritis/what-causes-rheumatoid-arthritis-inflammation.aspxGood article! Bumping it up!