Ankylosing Spondylitis

Ankylosing Spondylitis Surgery

Ankylosing Spondylitis is a disease which occurs in young kids and predominantly boys. It is a genetic disorder and it is linked to a gene named HLA B27. The disease starts in late teenage around 15-17. It affects the axial skeleton that means spine, pelvis, hips and sometimes the knee joints.

Ankylosing Spondylitis Symptoms

The early symptom of this disease is morning stiffness, which is basically, when the patient gets up in the morning there is stiffness in the lower back. Sometimes, the pain disturbs the sleep pattern as it occurs at say 4 in the morning. The stiffness disappears once they start walking in the morning. This happens in the beginning but as the disease progresses, patient’s posture becomes stooped due to the deformity in the patient’s spine. This is reflected when the patient bends forward. Over time, the hips become stiff and later on even the neck become stiff. It’s a very disabling disease for a young man.

Ankylosing Spondylitis Treatment

The ratio of disease is 9:1. If there are 9 males affected then there will be only one female affected. The treatments include medicines, some injections which are known as biologicals and more importantly physiotherapy which reduces the amount of deformity in the spine so that the patient can stand erect.

When a person breathes the rib cage expands, but if a person is suffering from Ankylosing, they lose the capacity to expand their ribs with age. Hence, the patient is not able to take deep breaths and ultimately they start having chest infections. To counter this, Physiotherapy plays a pivotal role in explaining the deep breathing exercises just like Pranayam in Yoga.

In spite of all the treatments, many of the patients get fused joints, especially, the hip joint. It restricts all the movements, hence, the patient is not able to bend forward, they are not able to do normal activities like sitting on a chair, sitting on a toilet seat, driving, climbing stairs everything becomes very difficult. So in that scenario, we have to sometimes operate. We have to replace their hips so that we give them at least some partial mobility. The disease usually burns out at around 40-45 years of age but it leaves its scares. That means the deformities persist forever. So the right time to act is in the young age to make an early diagnosis so that we can prevent the severity of deformities leftover after 40-45 years of age. So whenever a child or teenager comes with an early morning back pain we should always go for the Diagnostic tests and get them treated as soon as possible.

Looking for Best Ankylosing Spondylitis Doctor in Delhi? Contact Dr. Ashwani Maichand today.