What is the Difference Between Palindromic Rheumatism and Rheumatoid Arthritis

The key difference between palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis is that palindromic rheumatism is a type of inflammatory arthritis that does not cause permanent damages to joints, while rheumatoid arthritis is a type of inflammatory arthritis that causes permanent damages to joints.

Palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis are two types of inflammatory arthritis. Inflammatory arthritis is the joint inflammation that occurs due to an over-reactive immune system. This condition usually affects many joints throughout the body at the same time. Inflammatory arthritis is much less common than osteoarthritis, which affects most people in later stages of life.

CONTENTS

1. Overview and Key Difference
2. What is Palindromic Rheumatism 
3. What is Rheumatoid Arthritis
4. Similarities – Palindromic Rheumatism and Rheumatoid Arthritis
5. Palindromic Rheumatism vs Rheumatoid Arthritis in Tabular Form
6. Summary – Palindromic Rheumatism vs Rheumatoid Arthritis

What is Palindromic Rheumatism?

Palindromic rheumatism is an autoimmune disease. It is a type of inflammatory arthritis that does not cause permanent damage to joints. Normally, inflammation is caused by the body’s immune system, and it is a normal response to injury or infection. In palindromic rheumatism, the immune system attacks the joints mistakenly. Palindromic rheumatism affects men and women equally. Moreover, it is frequently present in Whipple disease that is caused by the infectious parasite Tropheryma whipplei. There may also be some genetic links for palindromic rheumatism.

The symptoms of this inflammatory condition include swelling of one or more joints, stiffness in affected joints, swelling and soreness in the tendons or other tissues around the joints, fatigue, restricted mobility, and low-grade fever. Palindromic rheumatism can be diagnosed through medical history and physical examination, joint fluid analysis, blood tests, and scans (X-ray). Furthermore, the treatment options include using non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) to reduce inflammation, hydroxychloroquine (Plaquenil) to decrease the frequency and the lengths of attacks, striking a healthy balance between activity and diet, adopting a nutritious diet, and committing to a treatment plan.

What is Rheumatoid Arthritis?

Rheumatoid arthritis is a type of inflammatory arthritis that causes permanent damage to joints. It is a long-term autoimmune disease that primarily affects joints. This disease can also affect other parts of the body, including skin, eyes, lungs, heart, nerves, and blood. The risk factors for causing this disease include sex (women affected more), age (common in middle age), family history and genetics (variation in human leukocyte antigen genes, especially HLA-DRB1 gene), smoking, and excess weight.

Moreover, the symptoms of this inflammatory condition include pain in more than one joint, stiffness in more than one joint, tenderness and swelling in more than one joint, weight loss, fever, weakness, low red blood cell count, inflammation around lungs, and inflammation around the heart. Rheumatoid arthritis can be diagnosed through physical examination, imaging tests (X-ray, MRI), and blood tests. Furthermore, the treatment options may include drugs such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), steroids, conventional DMARDs, biologic agents (abatacept), targeted synthetic DMARDs (baricitinib) to reduce inflammation, progression of rheumatoid arthritis, pain and swelling, and to suppress over-reactive body’s immune system, physical and occupational therapy and surgeries like synovectomy, tendon repair, joint fusion, and total joint replacement.

What are the Similarities Between Palindromic Rheumatism and Rheumatoid Arthritis?

• Palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis are two types of inflammatory arthritis.
• Both conditions are autoimmune diseases.
• Some symptoms like joint swelling, tenderness, and pain are present in both conditions.
• Both conditions have some genetic links.
• Anti cyclic citrullinated peptide antibodies (anti-CCP) and antikeratin antibodies (AKA) are present in the blood in both conditions.
• They have similar diagnosis procedures such as physical examinations, X-rays, and blood tests.
• They can be treated through anti-inflammatory drugs.

What is the Difference Between Palindromic Rheumatism and Rheumatoid Arthritis?

Palindromic rheumatism is a type of inflammatory arthritis that does not cause permanent damages to joints, while rheumatoid arthritis is a type of inflammatory arthritis that causes permanent damages to joints. Thus, this is the key difference between palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis. Furthermore, palindromic rheumatism affects one or more joints in the body, while rheumatoid arthritis affects more than one joint and other organs like skin, eyes, lungs, heart, nerves, and blood in the body.

The below infographic presents the differences between palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis in tabular form for side by side comparison.

Summary – Palindromic Rheumatism vs Rheumatoid Arthritis

Palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis are two types of inflammatory arthritis. They are autoimmune diseases. Palindromic rheumatism does not cause permanent damages to the joints, while rheumatoid arthritis causes permanent damages to the joints. So, this summarizes the difference between palindromic rheumatism and rheumatoid arthritis.

Reference:

1. “Palindromic Rheumatism.” Versus Arthritis.
2. “Rheumatoid Arthritis.” Mayo Clinic, Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research, 18 May 2021.

Image Courtesy:

1. “Inflamatory arthritis2010” By James Heilman, MD – Own work (CC BY-SA 3.0) via Commons Wikimedia
2. “Rheumatoid arthritis — Smart-Servier (cropped)” By Laboratoires Servier –  (CC BY-SA 3.0) via Commons Wikimedia