Treatment
Although there is no cure, the principles of treatment are, first, to minimize the swelling, pain, and damage; and second, to maintain joint function as closely to normal as possible.
To this end, a number of medical and surgical modalities are available to manage patients over the course of their disease. Drug therapy is an important part of this management as it is directed toward controlling the destructive inflammatory processes within the joint.The antiinflammatory agents commonly used for this control include aspirin and similar compounds referred to as nonsteroidal antiinflammatory agents. Whereas some symptoms and signs of the disease can be improved by these drugs, additional agents may be required for those patients who have continuing progressive damage. This treatment might include gold salts and antimalarial, antitumor, and immunosuppressive agents. Corticosteroid derivatives are recognized to be potent antiinflammatory agents with some immunomodulating effect. Although they may dramatically improve the most troublesome symptoms, they have not been proven to alter significantly the progression of the disease. Moreover, the side effects of these drugs may be hazardous over the many years needed to treat chronic conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis.
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