Rheumatoid arthritis, headaches, and dizziness: Is there a connection?

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disease that can cause headaches. Some RA treatments and complications can also cause dizziness.

RA mainly targets the synovial tissue that lines the joints, and the primary symptoms are joint pain and swelling. But RA can also cause a range of other symptoms, including headaches.

In this article, we look at the links between headaches, dizziness, and RA. We also explore how to treat and manage these issues.

RA is an autoimmune disease that causes inflammation and swelling. While these issues primarily affect the joints, they can develop in organs, including the brain.

One 2018 study examined how RA-related chronic inflammation affects the brain and found a link between inflammation and changes in brain connectivity patterns. This could lead to headaches.

Meanwhile, RA can cause cervicogenic headaches, which result from a problem in the spine of the neck.

Cervicogenic headaches may occur when RA damages the synovial joint C1-C2 in the upper spine. A person who experiences these headaches tends to have pain radiating from the neck to the back of the head.

RA can also cause vasculitis, which is inflammation of blood vessels. This swelling can limit blood flow and lead to brain, nerve, and spinal cord damage.

When vasculitis affects the central nervous system, people may experience:

• chronic headaches
• muscle weakness
• confusion
• vision problems
• pain
• a loss of sensation

Nervous system vasculitis can also lead to brain aneurysms, brain swelling, seizures, and blood clots.

In addition, a person with RA may have a higher risk of developing another issue that causes headaches.

As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) point out, people with RA are more likely to develop fibromyalgia, which causes:

• headaches
• migraine headaches
• memory and concentration issues
• difficulty sleeping
• depression
• anxiety
• fatigue
• pain and stiffness

And a 2017 study involving 58,749 participants suggests that people with migraine headaches have a higher risk of developing RA.

Migraine symptoms include:

• sensory changes, such as flashing lights in the field of vision
• one-sided head pain
• nausea and vomiting
• sensitivity to light and sound

Some RA treatments can cause headaches. For instance, aggressive corticosteroid use could trigger headaches and fatigue.

Doctors often prescribe disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs, sometimes called DMARDs, to treat RA. These drugs help slow the progression of the disease, but some can cause headaches, including:

• anakinra (Kineret)
• cyclosporine
• sulfasalazine (Azulfidine)
• hydroxychloroquine (Plaquenil)

While nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) — such as ibuprofen (Advil) — can help relieve mild headache pain, side effects of NSAID use are headaches and dizziness.

Also, there is a small risk that a person might get rebound headaches from taking NSAIDs. These are also called “medication overuse headaches. ”

Several conditions can cause headaches, and some can present similarly to RA. They can be serious, and anyone who may have symptoms should receive medical attention.

For example, infectious arthritis — also known as septic arthritis or reactive arthritis — can cause:

• a fever
• headaches
• chills
• weakness
• joint pain and swelling

Also, several autoimmune diseases other than RA can cause headaches, such as Lyme disease.

When the headache stems from migraine, try:

• avoiding triggers, which vary from person to person, but often include caffeine and alcohol
• having a steady eating and sleeping routine
• exercising regularly
• practicing stress-management techniques

Because some headaches may stem from NSAID use, it may help to take a break from these medicines.

If headaches result from RA-related issues of the head and neck, try:

• using relaxation techniques, such as yoga and deep breathing
• following an exercise routine recommended by a physical therapist
• improving sleep habits
• going to therapy, for people with depression
• taking NSAIDs as recommended

A person with RA may develop vasculitis. This can cause headaches that do not go away, and it requires prompt medical attention.

It can cause serious complications in the brain, including a burst aneurysm or a stroke.

Symptoms of a burst aneurysm include:

• a severe headache
• vision issues
• nausea and vomiting
• neck stiffness
• seizures
• light sensitivity
• loss of consciousness

Symptoms of a stroke include:

• weakness or numbness on one side of the body, including one side of the face or one arm or leg
• confusion
• difficulty speaking
• difficulty understanding speech
• trouble seeing
• a severe headache
• difficulty walking
• dizziness

Both are medical emergencies.

Anyone with RA and chronic migraine headaches that interfere with daily activities should make an appointment with a neurologist. They can confirm the migraine diagnosis and find an effective treatment.

While there is no cure for RA, it is possible to manage the symptoms — even severe headaches — and slow the disease’s progression.

If headaches result from a specific RA medication, there may be other effective options that do not have this side effect.

Anyone with RA and migraine headaches should speak with a doctor about the best approach. There is no cure for migraine, but emerging treatments have shown promise in minimizing symptoms.

Receiving prompt treatment for RA can help prevent complications of the disease — and avoiding complications such as vasculitis and brain inflammation may prevent headaches.

Preventive medications for migraine are also available. Anti-CGRPs are the newest option.

People with RA may develop headaches that are unrelated to the disease. Approximately 50% of adults worldwide have had at least one headache in the last year.

Headaches can also result from an RA treatment or complication. In addition, a person with RA may have a higher risk of another issue, such as fibromyalgia, that causes headaches.

Meanwhile, dizziness can also result from some RA treatments and complications. Many treatments for these issues are available, and a doctor can provide specific advice.

Receiving the right course of RA treatment early can help slow the progression of the disease and reduce the risk of complications, including those that cause headaches.

Rheumatoid arthritis, headaches, and dizziness: Is there a connection?

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disease that can cause headaches. Some RA treatments and complications can also cause dizziness.

RA mainly targets the synovial tissue that lines the joints, and the primary symptoms are joint pain and swelling. But RA can also cause a range of other symptoms, including headaches.

In this article, we look at the links between headaches, dizziness, and RA. We also explore how to treat and manage these issues.

RA is an autoimmune disease that causes inflammation and swelling. While these issues primarily affect the joints, they can develop in organs, including the brain.

One 2018 study examined how RA-related chronic inflammation affects the brain and found a link between inflammation and changes in brain connectivity patterns. This could lead to headaches.

Meanwhile, RA can cause cervicogenic headaches, which result from a problem in the spine of the neck.

Cervicogenic headaches may occur when RA damages the synovial joint C1-C2 in the upper spine. A person who experiences these headaches tends to have pain radiating from the neck to the back of the head.

RA can also cause vasculitis, which is inflammation of blood vessels. This swelling can limit blood flow and lead to brain, nerve, and spinal cord damage.

When vasculitis affects the central nervous system, people may experience:

• chronic headaches
• muscle weakness
• confusion
• vision problems
• pain
• a loss of sensation

Nervous system vasculitis can also lead to brain aneurysms, brain swelling, seizures, and blood clots.

In addition, a person with RA may have a higher risk of developing another issue that causes headaches.

As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) point out, people with RA are more likely to develop fibromyalgia, which causes:

• headaches
• migraine headaches
• memory and concentration issues
• difficulty sleeping
• depression
• anxiety
• fatigue
• pain and stiffness

And a 2017 study involving 58,749 participants suggests that people with migraine headaches have a higher risk of developing RA.

Migraine symptoms include:

• sensory changes, such as flashing lights in the field of vision
• one-sided head pain
• nausea and vomiting
• sensitivity to light and sound

Some RA treatments can cause headaches. For instance, aggressive corticosteroid use could trigger headaches and fatigue.

Doctors often prescribe disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs, sometimes called DMARDs, to treat RA. These drugs help slow the progression of the disease, but some can cause headaches, including:

• anakinra (Kineret)
• cyclosporine
• sulfasalazine (Azulfidine)
• hydroxychloroquine (Plaquenil)

While nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) — such as ibuprofen (Advil) — can help relieve mild headache pain, side effects of NSAID use are headaches and dizziness.

Also, there is a small risk that a person might get rebound headaches from taking NSAIDs. These are also called “medication overuse headaches. ”

Several conditions can cause headaches, and some can present similarly to RA. They can be serious, and anyone who may have symptoms should receive medical attention.

For example, infectious arthritis — also known as septic arthritis or reactive arthritis — can cause:

• a fever
• headaches
• chills
• weakness
• joint pain and swelling

Also, several autoimmune diseases other than RA can cause headaches, such as Lyme disease.

When the headache stems from migraine, try:

• avoiding triggers, which vary from person to person, but often include caffeine and alcohol
• having a steady eating and sleeping routine
• exercising regularly
• practicing stress-management techniques

Because some headaches may stem from NSAID use, it may help to take a break from these medicines.

If headaches result from RA-related issues of the head and neck, try:

• using relaxation techniques, such as yoga and deep breathing
• following an exercise routine recommended by a physical therapist
• improving sleep habits
• going to therapy, for people with depression
• taking NSAIDs as recommended

A person with RA may develop vasculitis. This can cause headaches that do not go away, and it requires prompt medical attention.

It can cause serious complications in the brain, including a burst aneurysm or a stroke.

Symptoms of a burst aneurysm include:

• a severe headache
• vision issues
• nausea and vomiting
• neck stiffness
• seizures
• light sensitivity
• loss of consciousness

Symptoms of a stroke include:

• weakness or numbness on one side of the body, including one side of the face or one arm or leg
• confusion
• difficulty speaking
• difficulty understanding speech
• trouble seeing
• a severe headache
• difficulty walking
• dizziness

Both are medical emergencies.

Anyone with RA and chronic migraine headaches that interfere with daily activities should make an appointment with a neurologist. They can confirm the migraine diagnosis and find an effective treatment.

While there is no cure for RA, it is possible to manage the symptoms — even severe headaches — and slow the disease’s progression.

If headaches result from a specific RA medication, there may be other effective options that do not have this side effect.

Anyone with RA and migraine headaches should speak with a doctor about the best approach. There is no cure for migraine, but emerging treatments have shown promise in minimizing symptoms.

Receiving prompt treatment for RA can help prevent complications of the disease — and avoiding complications such as vasculitis and brain inflammation may prevent headaches.

Preventive medications for migraine are also available. Anti-CGRPs are the newest option.

People with RA may develop headaches that are unrelated to the disease. Approximately 50% of adults worldwide have had at least one headache in the last year.

Headaches can also result from an RA treatment or complication. In addition, a person with RA may have a higher risk of another issue, such as fibromyalgia, that causes headaches.

Meanwhile, dizziness can also result from some RA treatments and complications. Many treatments for these issues are available, and a doctor can provide specific advice.

Receiving the right course of RA treatment early can help slow the progression of the disease and reduce the risk of complications, including those that cause headaches.

Rheumatoid arthritis

What is arthritis?

Arthritis is a disease in which inflammation of the joints occurs. There are many causes of arthritis: joint inflammation can develop due to infection, trauma, metabolic disorders, etc. In addition, there is autoimmune inflammation, which develops when the immune system begins to attack the body’s own tissues. The reason for this immunosuppression is unknown. Autoimmune diseases are numerous, they can affect any human organs, such as autoimmune thyroiditis (with thyroid damage), autoimmune hepatitis (with liver damage), and many others.

What is rheumatoid arthritis (RA)?

Autoimmune joint inflammation leads to the development of so-called rheumatoid arthritis; There are several of them, but the most common is rheumatoid arthritis (RA), which is also considered one of the most common autoimmune diseases, its prevalence reaches 1%.

Which joints are inflamed in RA?

RA can affect any joint of the hands and feet; in addition, inflammation of the jaw joint and some joints of the spine is possible, but this is much less common. The “favorite” joints of RA are the joints of the hands and feet, shoulders and knees – as a rule, the disease begins with inflammation of these joints.

Why don’t you provide a more detailed description of this disease?

To warn our readers against self-diagnosis. If you suspect you have arthritis, consult a rheumatologist.

How to understand that the joint is inflamed?

It is not difficult, the inflammation of the joint is visible to the naked eye. There are five known signs of inflammation that always appear with inflammation of any organ, including a joint: swelling, pain, warming, redness, dysfunction. The inflamed joint hurts, it is swollen, warm or even hot to the touch, reddening of the skin over the joint is possible, movements in the joint are difficult and painful. The presence of all five signs allows you to distinguish arthritis from other problems that cause pain and swelling in the joint area.

What to do if there is an inflammation of the joint?

Do not look for answers on the Internet, do not self-medicate. If inflammation occurs for no apparent reason (trauma, infection, etc.), then most likely it is rheumatic inflammation, and you need to contact a rheumatologist.

Can rheumatoid arthritis be cured?

RA is a chronic disease, it is impossible to completely get rid of it. Modern medicines can significantly curb the inflammatory process. In most cases (approximately 70% of patients), RA proceeds as a cyclic disease, i.e. exacerbations are replaced by remissions when nothing hurts; while remissions are quite long, reaching several years. It is also possible a constant course, which is observed in 20-25% of patients; at the same time, articular inflammation is present constantly, but moderately expressed. A severe course is observed much less frequently, in 5-10% of cases.

How long should the medication be taken?

Anti-inflammatory drugs are taken for long, long-term courses, in some cases, constantly.

Can such a long treatment harm the body?

Patients, as a rule, fear that taking drugs, especially such a long one, can have a bad effect on the body, spoil the liver, blood, etc. These fears are greatly exaggerated. Indeed, there is a concept of the risk of side effects. Each drug has a list of side effects that may develop while taking it. But “maybe” does not mean “necessarily”, so you do not need to try on the entire list listed in the instructions in advance (by the way, the better the drug is studied, the “terrifying” its instructions). In fact, really dangerous complications during RA treatment are rare. In addition, during treatment, the rheumatologist regularly checks whether the drug has any undesirable effect on the body; To do this, according to a certain schedule, the patient must take tests and undergo research. If necessary, preventive measures are taken, the dose of the drug is adjusted or the drug is replaced with another one. In addition, there is the concept of benefit-risk ratio. In other words, taking medications carries a risk, but a small one, while “NOT taking” medications will necessarily and certainly lead to the progression of inflammation, complications and a sharp deterioration in health.

What happens if you don’t get treated?

If left untreated, the inflammation will develop uncontrollably and invade new joints. Prolonged inflammation in the joints leads to their gradual destruction and disability. Before the advent of modern drugs, patients with rheumatoid arthritis became disabled after 3-5 years from the onset of the disease. At present, this no longer happens.

Is it necessary to take hormones?

Many patients are so afraid of the very word “hormones” that they do not even try to delve into the essence of their upcoming treatment, worrying only about not being prescribed these same hormones. At the same time, many do not even imagine what kind of hormones we are talking about. This attitude has developed, in part, due to medical practice. More recently, steroid hormones (such as prednisone) have been widely prescribed for arthritis. At that time, there were no modern drugs, and the use of steroids was an achievement. Steroids, on the one hand, have a pronounced anti-inflammatory property, and on the other hand, they have a very high frequency of severe side effects. Therefore, patients of the middle of the last century had to pay too high a price for the relief of their suffering. But a lot has changed since then. Prednisolone and its analogues have remained in rheumatology, but their regimens have become much more gentle, and they are used only in situations where it is really necessary, that is, in cases of the most severe inflammation. In RA, such a need sometimes arises, but not in all patients.

What drugs are used to treat RA?

Two types of drugs are used to treat RA. The first is non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). They act for 6-24 hours, during which pain, swelling and other signs of inflammation decrease or disappear. But when the effect of the drug ends, the inflammation returns again. Thus, NSAIDs only improve well-being by dampening inflammation for some time. This is definitely not enough. Figuratively speaking, NSAIDs “remove the top” of inflammation, but cannot “eradicate” it. Therefore, the second type of drugs is also used – basic antirheumatic drugs. These drugs have a different effect: they suppress the formation of the inflammatory process in the body. It is the basic drugs that are the main ones in the treatment of RA, allow you to achieve remissions and are used for many years.

Why don’t you name specific drugs?

In order not to provoke attempts at self-treatment.

They say that plasmapheresis helps well?

For reasons that are incomprehensible to us, plasmapheresis is indeed too widely used in our country for a variety of diseases, including rheumatic diseases. And the worst thing is that among patients and even among some doctors there is an extremely frivolous attitude towards this most serious procedure. At the same time, all over the world, plasmapheresis is used only in life-threatening conditions, when the patient really needs to be saved, and not in order to “cleanse the blood.”

What’s New in RA Treatment?

Recently, we have been observing the development of a new class of drugs – the so-called biological agents. They also belong to the basic drugs, but they have not a general, but a targeted effect on certain parts of the inflammatory process. Some biological agents are successfully used in those patients who have not been helped by treatment with standard basic drugs. It is already obvious that the use of biological agents will solve many difficult issues in the treatment of RA. But while they are in the stage of practical study and in the foreseeable future, they are unlikely to replace the “old” basic drugs.

Is it true that biological agents can cure RA?

No that’s not true. So far, no drugs have been found that can cure RA. In addition, like all drugs, biological agents have contraindications and side effects, so they are not suitable for all patients.

Does homeopathy help? What about phytotherapy?

No, neither homeopathy nor herbal treatment for rheumatoid arthritis helps. More precisely, these treatments may have some symptomatic effect, but nothing more. But for RA this is not enough.

What is good to eat with RA?

There are universal recommendations on nutrition for arthritis. They are listed on our website in the “Arthrosis” section.

How to prepare for an RA consultation?

If this diagnosis has already been established, then all available images, analyzes and extracts must be brought to the consultation. There is no need to do any research specifically for consultation. If there is only a suspicion, and no analyzes and studies have yet been performed, then there is no need to do them.

E.L. Nasonov “A sharp turn. From support to cure»

Be careful: rheumatoid arthritis “masquerades” as a common cold!

Headache, fever, pain in the temporomandibular joint and swelling of the tissues around it, accompanied by pain in the ear, patients often take for symptoms of diseases of the ear, throat, nose and go to the ENT. However, you should not rush into choosing a specialist, because it is precisely such a clinical picture that may indicate the onset of rheumatoid arthritis.

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic disease characterized by inflammation and bone and joint destruction. It occurs due to disorders in the immune system.
The disease affects people of all ages, but according to statistics, the beautiful half of humanity is affected, more often over 40 years old.

According to Dmitry Rekalov, Head of the Department of Rheumatology and Immunobiological Therapy, Zaporozhye Regional Hospital, Dr. med. Sciences, one of the first symptoms is pain in the joints and a feeling of morning stiffness, which disappears after a while. At the initial stage of the disease, the joints at the base of the index and middle fingers, the wrist joints and the joints at the base of the toes become inflamed. With this disease, lesions also occur in other joints: temporomandibular, carpal, knee.

Quite often, patients complain of deterioration in sleep and appetite, fever and swollen lymph nodes, quickly get tired and rapidly lose weight.

The disease is very insidious: after a while the patient’s condition improves significantly, and after suffering from influenza, acute respiratory infections or emotional upheavals, rheumatism returns again.

According to many doctors, the main cause of rheumatoid arthritis is a latent infection, because most of the disease begins as a cold. Also, the disease can be the result of hypothermia or severe stress.

Lately experts have been talking about the genetic predisposition to the disease.

Patients often put off a visit to the hospital, trying to be cured by traditional methods, but to no avail.

Rheumatoid arthritis is an extremely dangerous disease: if left untreated, it can cause damage to internal organs (heart, lungs, kidneys) and other serious complications. That is why it is extremely important to consult a doctor in a timely manner.

Over 15 years of work, methods of treating such diseases have been radically improved. The Department of Rheumatology and Immunobiological Therapy of the Zaporozhye Regional Hospital uses the latest developments of world specialists , which allows patients with rheumatoid arthritis to restore their health as soon as possible and restore their previous quality of life.

As a treatment for the disease, rheumatologists of the regional hospital use drug therapy to reduce inflammation and pain.