Joint Pain: Why Proper Diagnosis Is Important

The prevalence of chronic joint pain in the United States is nothing short of staggering — more than 54 million people have arthritis alone. This is to say nothing of the millions more who struggle with more acute problems, such as tendon or ligament damage in their joints. 

In either case, joint pain is one problem that you shouldn’t ignore, because a proper diagnosis and early treatment can mean the difference between severe limitations and getting back to your active lifestyle.

Our team here at Advanced Spine Care and Pain Management understands this better than most, and we see our fair share of patients who complain of joint pain and arthritis. When you come to see us in the earliest stages of joint pain, we can identify and treat the problem right away, giving you much better long-term prospects.

Behind the joint pain

There are many conditions that can lead to both chronic and acute joint pain, with arthritis leading the charge (usually in the chronic category). While 54 million Americans have actually been diagnosed with arthritis, the Arthritis Foundation states that the number of people with arthritis or arthritis symptoms may really be as high as 92 million.

One of the primary reasons behind the hard-to-pin-down numbers is that arthritis is a catchall term for any disease that causes pain and inflammation in your joints.

Outside of arthritis, there are many other conditions that can lead to joint pain, such as:

• Ligament damage (sprains or tears)
• Tendonitis or tendonosis
• Bursitis
• Complex regional pain syndrome
• Fibromyalgia

These conditions include acute problems, as well as chronic and systemic diseases.

Diagnosis of joint pain is key

As you can see by the possible list of culprits of joint pain, identifying the source of your joint pain is the first, and arguably the most important, step to regaining pain-free movement.

When you come see us, we first review your symptoms and then turn to advanced imaging to get a closer look inside your joints.

Once we locate the problem, we can get you the treatment you need to improve the health of your joints.

To give you an idea of the importance of a proper diagnosis, let’s take a look at two different scenarios. Suppose you begin to feel pain in your knee or ankle, but you ignore it thinking it will go away on its own. The problem here is that if the pain is due to a partial tear in one of the connective tissues inside your joint, you run the risk of a complete rupture if you don’t seek early intervention. This means that your treatment possibilities get narrowed down to one — surgical repair of the complete tear.

When it comes to chronic conditions like arthritis, there’s much we can do to slow the progression and impact of the disease if we identify and treat the problem in its earliest stages. Through pain and inflammation management, as well as physical therapy and certain lifestyle changes, we can ward off the serious limitations that come with advancing arthritis.

The bottom line is that pain of any kind is your body’s way of telling you that something is wrong. Through our advanced diagnostic services, we can get to the bottom of the problem and get you on the right treatment path, which can save you from some far more serious problems down the road. 

To get started, contact one of our two offices in Staten Island or Hartsdale, New York, to set up an appointment.