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What is rheumatoid arthritis?
Answered By Alex Trenor, Editor
Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease. Normally, the cells called antibodies being produced by the body’s immune system, attack the foreign substances such as bacteria and viruses. With autoimmune diseases, the immune system mistakes the person’s own tissue as foreign and attacks it.
With rheumatoid arthritis, the antibodies attack the membranes around the joints that cause swelling, pain and stiffness. In some cases, rheumatoid arthritis can cause deformity.
Rheumatoid arthritis also causes inflammation of the sheaths around the tendons, the one that join muscles to bones.
--- permission must be obtained from editor Alex Trenor to re-publish ---
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