This is important because it can help guide the treatment decisions you and your healthcare provider make.
For example, it could be used to compare the effectiveness of different medications.
Identifying remission is especially important when making decisions about going off of your RA medication(s).
Verywell / Hilary Allison
(The same factors are also used to select participants for RA research studies.)
What Are Joint Counts?
They’ll then feel it for sponginess and other signs of swelling.
They’ll also compare the joints on each side.
While feeling the joint, they’ll ask you if it’s tender or painful.
You may also be asked to move a joint in a certain way to see if it hurts.
Studies have also shown that examining more joints doesn’t improve accuracy.
It excludes the joints of the feet because those can be harder to assess, even with training.
A 44-Swollen Joint Count was part of the original DAS but has been largely replaced by the 28-joint count.
The joints are broken into groups that are evaluated differently.
The total score can range from 0 to 78.
(Note that the hip joints can be evaluated for tenderness onlynot for swelling.)
That means the score for the knee, which is the largest joint, counts the most.
The total score can range from 0 to 534, with higher numbers indicating more disease activity.
Joints included in this index are:
The presence of other pain conditions may complicate the joint-count process.
Often, peoplewho are in remissionsee their healthcare providers less frequently than those with active and worsening symptoms.
That increased time between appointments could mean you miss early signs that your disease is coming out of remission.
Self-joint counts could be a solution to that, but only if they’re accurate.
Studies of self-count accuracy have had mixed results.
That, however, should never fully replace recommended follow-up appointments.
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