A chronic inflammatory disorder that can damage many of your body systems is known as rheumatoid arthritis. This condition can damage your joints and your skin, lungs, heart, eyes, blood vessels, and more. The body can attack its own tissues in error causing autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis. The lining of your joints is affected by rheumatoid arthritis causing painful swelling. Over time this can cause bone erosion or joint deformity and potentially damage other areas of the body as well. Physical disabilities can be caused by rheumatoid arthritis making it urgent to seek medical treatment and get in front of this condition.

Sign and symptoms may surface in parts of the body besides your joints. Some of the primary signs and symptoms associated with rheumatoid arthritis include…

• Tender joints
• Swollen joints
• Warm joints
• Stiffness in joints (typically worse in the mornings)
• Fatigue
• Fever
• Loss of appetite

About 40% of people with this condition experience signs and symptoms in other areas of the body including…

• Skin
• Lungs
• Heart
• Eyes
• Kidneys
• Nerve tissue
• Salivary glands
• Blood vessels
• Bone marrow