I’m a 28 year old guy, no signs of arthritis yet. But both my parents have quite debilitating and different forms of arthritis.
My dad (54 years old) thought he tore something in his knee getting out of his car on some ice recently. It wasn’t healing. MRI revealed that he just has terrible arthritis. He’s about 200lbs and 6 feet tall and fairly active still. But for years his knees have made it hard for him to hike or mountain bike. He still goes, but complains constantly. He can not do a squat, can’t sit cross-leg, and has trouble getting down onto the ground or back up (for like 10 years straight).
My mom used to cut hair, now she has really bad arthritis in her fingers, and some in her back. She’s far more mobile than my dad. Also a healthy weight. I’m a software engineer so my fingers are quite important to me.
Neither of them smoke or drink alcohol - at all.
I’m super active. I ran track in college. I mountain bike, freedive, backpack, pretty much anything outdoors. Exercise fairly regularly (2 times a week). My hope is that staying healthy and active is enough. But seeing them struggle to keep up has me worried. They haven’t aged much, but it’s like they feel pain moving.
My maternal grandpa was backpacking and biking into his early 70s pain-free. I’d see that as an absolute win compared to my parents. The research I did this morning had some basic suggestions, but also a lot of “we don’t really know.”
I’ve had a few sports injuries, but nothing that has bothered me after it healed. Some were serious enough to required physical therapy. Mostly ankle and wrist sprains, plus regular stress fractures in my feet from indoor track.
Correct me if I’m wrong: but right now one of the things I want to incorporate more of is mobility work. I like yoga so that’s probably what I’ll try to add more of. Once a week was what I was planning on. I do a lot of active things that I don’t consider exercise, like biking to work, walking the dog, etc.
Also, I don’t run a ton anymore, but it’s never bothered me and I love going on a run every now and again. The research here seems to be super conflicting. My interpretation is that you can run unless you have arthritis and it bothers you. But running doesn’t seem to cause arthritis or knee pain (even though a lot of personal anecdotal stories blame running on knee issues). In general, the lower impact the activity though, the better it is for people with arthritis.
So if anyone has resources to link to, or long-term lifestyle suggestions, I’m all ears. My ultimate goal would be to just feel as healthy as I do right now, for as long as possible.
And so; what lifestyle practices combat/prevent arthritis?
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I think you are on the right track with mobility/yoga/stretching, but at some point if you live long enough, you may run out of cushion in your joints regardless.
I’m not a guy, but this is also one of the reasons I am using MHT after menopause. My mom had osteoarthritis and osteoporosis and the longer I can keep it at bay, the better.
Avoiding too much inflammation is also important, overall wellness and keeping slim, but as you know from your parents it’s not a magic wand.
Damn, your father sounds exactly like me. But I’m 30yo 😔
First, let’s clarify that when docs say a joint is arthritic, they usually mean it’s showing signs of significant inflammation (osteoarthritis), which is a very different thing than Rheumatoid Arthritis - RA is an autoimmune disorder where the immune system is degrading normal tissue. If you haven’t been diagnosed with RA, then they’re referring to OA, or inflammation.
All of us have some osteoarthritis as we age, I we probably have varying levels of OA in different joints at any given time.
There’s a phrase “motion is the lotion” - meaning keeping active is key to preventing joint issues.
Joints don’t like inactivity, I’d guess largely because cartilage isn’t vascular (it lacks a blood supply), so requires a different mechanism to keep it hydrated and fed. That occurs via motion: the action of moving a joint, applying pressure and releasing pressure, moves synovial fluid through cartilage, keeping it hydrated and flexible.
So keep moving.
Great info, thank you! Adding it to my notes.
Stretching is your best bet. It’s so essential, especially later in life. Also look into omega 3 and 6.
Something probably nobody here wants to hear, but I developed arthritis in my hands from typing all the time. I was a very fast typer, so that might have been a factor.
I’m curious whether keyboard layout matters. Around 15 years ago I came to the conclusion that I would be using a keyboard as part of both job and hobby for the rest of my life, and while typing didn’t cause any issues, I did notice some discomfort after really long days. This prompted me to try layouts with fewer awkward keystrokes, and this discomfort disappeared with Dvorak.
And just for the record, I don’t buy the claim you hear some places that Dvorak allows you to type faster. That was never part of my equation anyway.
I would assume it does. Ergonomic keyboards may be less of a risk.
High Omega-3 Diets are linked to lower rates of RA, same with Vitamin D.
Moderate alcohol intake (1-3 drinks per week) is also associated with lower autoimmune risk, but they don’t know why yet.
Dental disease is linked to RA, so keep your teeth clean.
Last but not least, decent sleep.
There’s a Know How or How To (I don’t remember the name of the YouTube channel; EDIT: @executivechimp@discuss.tchncs.de found it. The video is linked in their comment) that explains why we used to believe moderate alcohol consumption is healthy.
Turns out, those surveys only ask “How many drinks do you have a week?” Notice they tacitly ask about the present, how many drinks now and not in the past. If you were a very heavy drinker in the past and got sick from it, you likely stopped drinking altogether.
Not only that, but people with chronic illness many times choose to not drink at all.
These two populations (sick ex-drinkers and chronically sick non-drinkers) make it seem as if not drinking is not that healthy. But remove those groups from the data analysis or control for past alcohol usage and pre-existing conditions and you end up with a clear pattern: drinking alcohol in any quantity is unhealthy. The more, the worse.
Sorry for the lack of sources; I’m on mobile. I think there’s a WHO report titled “There’s no safe amount of alcohol” or something like that.
Drinking poison that causes inflammation and cell damage is bad? Who knew?
Possibly this video by Howtown.
That’s it!
That’s a fantastic watch. Many thanks.
Damn. I don’t get enough fish in my diet, and have to take Vitamin D supplements to get enough of that too. I drink too much as well (made a resolution to quit, though; it’s been a week without a drink), and have to vape weed every day in order to get tired enough to sleep.
No wonder why I developed arthritis in my early 20s. I just thought it was genetic.
and have to vape weed every day in order to get tired enough to sleep
You need to talk to a medic or psychiatrist about this, I’ve had the same issue since I was born and averaged a couple of all-nighters a month just staring at the ceiling.
Now I take meds ( 25mg Seroquel, but dont blindly trust me and ask a professional for one more suited to you), and go to sleep regularly every night, and even better, I get sleepy in the evening, which is something I could have never dreamt of back when I needed to roll in my sheets to tire myself out.
If anything I said resonates with you, please try it, even if you have legal weed where you live it’s not worth the side effects and the sleep from it is barely decent
I think OP may be asking about Osteoarthritis not Rheumatoid Arthritis. Osteoarthritis being the most common type cause by simple wear and tear and age.
They may have similar symptoms but have very different causes. Your advice has more to do with regulation of your immune system which is more helpful for RA than OA.
Hey, there. It sounds like you’re less concerned about your genetic proclivity to an autoimmune arthritis and more looking for ways to stave off any kind of arthritic degeneration, including your standard-issue osteoarthritis. I’m a 38-year-old who is embarking on a race against the progression of arthritis and other skeletal/connective tissue maladies due to a genetic joint hypermobility disorder that I’m similarly trying to get out in front of. Here’s what I’ve found so far, with the obligatory “I am not a doctor,” and, “Your mileage may vary.”:
- Keep baseline-inflammation down wherever you can. It sounds like woo-woo crap, but finding things specific to your body that cause inflammation and cutting them out will go further than you think. That goes for both diet and activities. Consider an elimination diet to help you figure out what those things are. For me, anything that’s particularly acidic makes me feel like crap, as does sugar and processed meats. I go through phases of being good at avoiding these things followed by phases where I completely fail at it. A lot of people swear by ginger/turmeric for anti-inflammatory properties but I try to avoid taking supplements of it because there have been recent studies that show a lot of the supplements made from dried/ground down fibers like that tend to keep your kidneys from functioning as well as they should.
- Omega 3s and 6s are great for maintaining (and possibly also repairing?) cartilage. Glucosamine, too.
- Strengthen your muscles so you aren’t relying so much on your tendons and bones to support you as you age, thus reducing the overall load on them and keeping them healthy for longer. Probably want to do low-impact stuff. I’m personally doing Pilates because yoga over-stretches my hypermobile joints and I also just find it boring. Lifting weights is also proven to increase your bone density, so it’s just good for you overall. And I feel like this part is obvious, but the less weight you carry, the less you’ll tax your body.
- This may be less applicable to you, but the things I take to keep my bones and connective tissue as healthy as possible include: Multivitamin, an extra Vitamin D supplement, a manganese B12 supplement, and collagen-based protein powder (though be careful of lead levels in protein powders in general).
I wish you luck in your quest. I personally am just holding out for a full-body exoskeleton. That’d be pretty badass.
Great info, thank you!! I’m compiling the things I’ve learned to make a personal list of things to try to add more of to my life, and things to try and have less of. I’m starting to realize that diet isn’t something to ignore just because I’m fit…
I’ve not extensively researched this but: Fish oil. And I think everyone should take a multivitamin. The magnesium oxide and zinc oxide in multis are hard to absorb, so take additional magnesium and zinc. Zinc comes in 50 mg, RDA is 11, so I cut it into 4.
Ergo keyboard.
Finally motion is lotion. Go through full ranges of motion. Cartilage has very little blood flow and requires the fluid around it to move to get nutrients and such. Little bits throughout the day are probably better than lots once a week. Don’t resume running because that’s high impact. Do sprints if you really want that kind of motion.
I’ve got the supplements, just need to work on making a habit of taking them…
Little bits throughout the day are probably better than lots once a week
I sit at a desk a TON. Started having back problems and was trying to work in exercises to help. What ended up working for me is an hourly notification that gives me a random exercise to do. I’ll usually do a few other exercises with each break as well. It’s been a miracle for my back, and definitely is something I plan to stick with - and should be good for arthritis too it seems!
I’m still curious about that myself. I’m 42 years old, and a former but not fully retired BMX flatland rider.
My late father suffered Rheumatoid Arthritis, and I’ve had some rough BMX accidents that caused me over 7 years of joint pains, but after lots of forced flexing, those pains are thankfully gone now.
But I’m just a random nobody, and am not a medical expert. I don’t think random people on Lemmy are qualified to answer medical questions…
I sprained both my wrists in a bike crash, then just as they were nearly healed I crashed again and sprained just my left wrist. After like 9 months it was still bothering me a bit so I decided to go to physical therapy and the exercises cleared everything up in ~3 weeks. Wish I’d known earlier that a brace and limiting movement wasn’t actually helping anything.
I sprained both of my wrists back in 2012 practicing too many BMX flatland tricks. Even so, with both wrists sprained, I made up a crazy but actually wrist gentle trick, it was more or less all in the feet…
Pretty sweet! I’m still trying to learn to wheelie my mountain bike so that I can learn to manual after that…
Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease that you are more prone to due to genetics. Unfortunately there’s not a lot you can do to avoid it if you are going to have it. You should stay up to date on it as our understanding of autoimmune diseases changes constantly. Make sure you are mentioning to your doctor that your father has rheumatoid arthritis. Catching it early before joint damage occurs is key. The moment you feel swelling or pain in your joints you need to speak to a doctor about it and discuss your family medical history, don’t leave it until the damage is done. We have better medications today than your father had.
Especially when (IIRC) it is linked with our natural biome which we are only recently starting to study.
Yes, healthy eating and an antiinflammatory diet can be very important in managing autoimmune disorders.
Lots of things already mentioned, but to add: Be careful playing certain sports. Damaging your joints frequently can also lead to osteo arthritis or make it appear earlier.
Thus far, I’ve been pretty un-safe when it comes to mountain biking. Lot’s of little crashes that could have been easily avoided. Fortunately I hate crashing and have been working on risk analysis and I don’t think I’ll lose out on much fun by being 20% safer. I’m currently down-tuning one of my bikes to make it less capable so that it’ll be more fun on simpler trails. With a super capable bike, it sometimes feels like you have to ride the gnarliest things to be having fun. Riding a gravel bike (the least capable of the off-road bikes) on one of my least favorite boring trails was eye-opening to me on how fun “under-biking” is. And any speed decrease increases safety a lot.
The classic factors such as body mass, and repetitive movements of course, but there is interesting research indicating overall body inflammation and hyperinsulinemia could be a factor in chronic osteoarthritis
TLDR - Stay insulin sensitive, get sleep, avoid chronic stress and inflammation.
excerpt from Ketogenic
7.2.3.1 Osteoarthritis -At the joint level we have historically considered osteoarthritis to be a load-related condition, but it is increasingly being considered as an inflammatory arthritis. Inflammatory joint diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, and lupus have their basis in inflammation and autoimmune disease. … Emerging evidence is that joint inflammation is centrally tied to insulin load 20,23. … Insulin has also been shown to decrease human chondrocyte autophagy, thereby inhibiting cartilage formation and endochondral ossification, and thereby acting as another contributing factor to the development of osteoarthritis 23.
AGEs (advanced glycation endproducts), which are related to long-term hyperglycaemia, accumulate in the cartilage of joints as well as in tendons and soft tissues. Their accumulation affects the elasticity of all those tissues and is associated with increased fatigue, wear and tear phenomena and then, symptomatic deterioration 27,31. Reducing the hyperglycaemic state and elevated insulin concentrations over the long-term has clear implications for reducing AGEs accumulating in cartilage and tendons.
Thanks!! Just did a bunch of insulin research and added key takeaways to my notes. I’m pretty great at getting good sleep, and work has finally started to slow down making my life feel far less stressful
The easy thing to monitor for your healthy insulin sensitivity is your TG/HDL ratio. https://hackertalks.com/post/5922188 You want it to be less then 1.
You get these figures on any standard lipid test, so you should have annual numbers already. If you keep this less then 1, then your going to stay low insulin, sensitive, and avoid AGEs.
When you finish your notes, I’d love to read them, I want to avoid arthritis too!
A vegan diet or one at least heavily plant-based (and diets like the Mediterranean one) are consistently linked to lower inflammation in meta-analysis after meta-analysis.
Edit: I have no clue why this is getting downvoted. Examples below:
- “The present systematic review provides evidence that vegan and vegetarian diets are associated with lower CRP levels, a major marker of inflammation and a mediator of inflammatory processes.” —Scientific Reports (2020)
- “This umbrella review offers valuable insights on the estimated reduction of risk factors for cardiometabolic diseases and cancer, and the CVDs-associated mortality, offered by the adoption of plant-based diets through pleiotropic mechanisms. Through the improvement of glycolipid profile, reduction of body weight/BMI, blood pressure, and systemic inflammation, A/AFPDs significantly reduce the risk of ischemic heart disease, gastrointestinal and prostate cancer, as well as related mortality.” —PLoS One (2024)
- “Evidence strongly suggests that plant-based dietary patterns that are abundant in fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, legumes, and whole grains with less emphasis on animal foods and processed foods are a useful and a practical approach to preventing chronic diseases. Such dietary patterns, from plant-exclusive diets to plant-centered diets, are associated with improved long-term health outcomes and a lower risk of all-cause mortality. Given that neurodegenerative disorders share many pathophysiological mechanisms with CVD, including oxidative stress, inflammation, and vascular damage, it is reasonable to deduce that plant-based diets can ameliorate cognitive decline as well.” —Advances in Nutrition (2019)
A vegan diet is just generally lower in inflammatory foods than an omnivorous one.
Thanks for the info!
I actually know a bit about low-inflammation diets (mostly low meat and being selective on carbs) from when I was running track. I always saw it as a high-performance thing, but some habits have stuck around. And for a long time I’ve done Meatless-Mondays since it’s an easy and mostly thought-less thing to do.
People shouldn’t down vote you, the research is true.
However, the modern western diet is so bad (sugar, diabetes, cvd, etc) that anything compared to it will show a improvement. People might be reacting to the prescriptive tone of your statement.
I know you mean well, but please explain the difference in tone between my comment (just the original, which the downvotes came from) and this one with 20 upvotes and 0 downvotes. Functionally there is no difference in tone or (as you noted) factual accuracy. If anything, the linked comment is more prescriptive in that it directly tells the reader what to do (“keep your teeth clean”). That I compared an omnivorous diet negatively against a predominantly or wholly plant-based one in any way is the obvious reason why this has as many downvotes as upvotes: people are conditioned to see any mention of a vegan diet’s health benefits as preachy and dogmatic.
People get really emotional about the goodness of their chosen (or more likely accidental) diet.
The other comment you linked to mentioned Omega-3, Vitamin D, moderate alcohol, and brushing teeth - it did not mention a specific dietary intervention (or suggest one).
make ceos less
