Rheumatology can often be a confusing subject to approach. At Brecken Health Mandurah, we often get questions about what it is, what do rheumatologists do, and when you might need to see one.
So we’ve broken it down for you, to help you understand how this specialist branch of medicine can help you.
What is rheumatology?
Rheumatology deals with the connecting tissues within the body. The things like your joints, muscles, and bones. These are known as your musculoskeletal system, and are critical for good movement.
The name ‘rheumatology’, however, comes from the ancient Greek word ‘rheuma’, meaning ‘that which flows’. At this time, this was related to the concept of four different humours flowing around the body. It’s a confusing topic, but give them a little slack—it was almost 2,000 years ago.
It essentially boiled down to how your feelings physically manifested. Then, over time, aches and pains were grouped under the term ‘rheumatology’. While it’s taken on a vastly different meaning today, it’s still about flows and movement—only now, about how your body moves.
What is a rheumatologist?
A rheumatologist is a specialist who diagnoses and treats conditions affecting your joints, muscles, bones, and immune system, offering comprehensive care and support.
They study and manage inflammation that causes swelling, stiffness, and chronic pain. These conditions are generally caused by an overactive immune system attacking healthy organs and tissues, leading to inflammation and damage.
A rheumatologist also helps manage long-term conditions like osteoarthritis, gout, and fibromyalgia, providing ongoing care to improve quality of life and prevent disease progression.
As well, they also manage autoinflammatory diseases: conditions where the patient develops symptoms like fevers, rashes, or joint pain without any apparent cause.
Rheumatologists often work alongside GPs, physiotherapists, and other healthcare professionals to deliver comprehensive care to patients with complex musculoskeletal and autoimmune diseases. By using their specialty, they can support these healthcare specialists in diagnosing other non-inflammatory musculoskeletal and pain conditions.
What does a rheumatologist do?
Rheumatic conditions manifest in a few common ways:
- Severe and persistent joint pains;
- Ongoing aches in your back and neck; or
- Stiff and swollen joints.
And while they’re easy to shrug off as simple pain, if the pain and swelling doesn’t go away, it’s time to see a specialist.
A rheumatologist helps patients to manage and treat joint pain. They assess and treat patients experiencing unexplained joint and muscle pain, stiffness, or swelling, providing an expert opinion and creating tailored treatment plans.
Rheumatologists also offer ongoing care for chronic conditions like gout, fibromyalgia, and psoriatic arthritis. They help prevent disease progression and manage symptoms effectively. It’s a similar outcome to what orthopedic surgeons deliver. However, unlike orthopedic surgeons, rheumatologists focus on non-surgical treatments like lifestyle modifications and therapies.
They also prescribe medications, like disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs) and biologics—powerful drugs that are only prescribed if DMARD treatment isn’t effective—to control inflammation, prevent joint damage, and slow the progression of rheumatic diseases.
What can a rheumatologist diagnose?
The list of conditions a rheumatologist can diagnose is long. After all, aches and pains can occur anywhere in the body.
There are over 100 types of rheumatic diseases. Some of the more common diseases that rheumatologists treat are:
- Forms of arthritis, like osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, and gout.
- Spinal disease.
- Pain, inflammation, and injury in muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints.
- Osteoporosis, as patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases are at higher risk of developing this condition.
- Fibromyalgia, where patients experience wide-ranging pain in muscles and soft tissue all over the body.
- Scleroderma, which causes inflammation, swelling, stiffness, and pain in joints, tendons, ligaments, and bones.
- Lupus, the autoimmune disease that causes your body’s immune system to attack your tissue and organs.
- Inflammatory myositis, which causes muscle inflammation and weakness.
- Vasculitis, a disease that causes inflammation in your blood vessels themselves.
As you can see, a rheumatologist can provide diagnosis and support for a vast range of different conditions and diseases, all with the goal of managing your way to better movement.
When to see a rheumatologist in Mandurah
You shouldn’t have to live your life with ongoing muscle stiffness, soft tissue pain, or swollen joints. Help is out there.
If you’re living with any of these symptoms, get in touch with Brecken Health Mandurah to book an appointment with our rheumatologist. They can discuss your symptoms, diagnose what’s wrong, and help create a plan that supports you in your health journey.