Reiter’s Syndrome

Reiter’s Syndrome takes place as a reaction of infection in some part of our body. Patient’s joints suffer from this reaction and the condition called arthritis inflicts the joint area. As per the survey conducted, the condition has been seen to have affected 5% of people out of every 10000 people aged between 18 and 16. There was no bias towards affecting men and women.

Symptoms

The symptoms start to develop after some time, as soon as the scars and infection starts to go off the body. A scaly skin rash over hands as well as feet, diarrhoea, fever, weight loss, mouth ulcers are the most common symptoms of the Reiter’s Syndrome. Symptoms develop within 4 weeks. The joint areas suffer the most during the symptoms calling for arthritis. They can develop in a quick manner and gradually spreads through the joints. The most affected areas are knees, ankles, toes as well as the surrounding ligaments. The joints get sore and swollen. Staining on the underpants i.e. discharge of the urethra leads to Urethritis. Patients may have a feeling of burning sensation at the time of passing urine. In case of conjunctivitis, patient’s eyes turn red and sore. Liquid in the form of pus gets discharged from the eyes of the patient.

Causes

Reiter’s Syndrome is caused by the bacteria which attacks the human body’s immune system. After that the human body becomes over-immune and instead of killing the bacteria, the tissues present in the body start getting damaged. The most common areas where the infection in a human body triggers are bladder, penis or vagina. Bacteria can also cause viral infection which affects throat as well as nose. HIV infection is also one of the major factors which lead to AIDS. As per the survey done, 1 quarter of people get affected with the Reiter’s Syndrome with the bacterial infection and rest of the cases suffer since they have these genes already present in the human body.

Diagnosis

Tests can not be conducted on the person suffering from the Reiter’s Syndrome. For patient suffering from arthritis, blood tests and X-Rays can be done to find out the root cause of the condition.

Treatment

Treatment not only includes treatment of infection but treating the other symptoms of the disease. Doctors mainly prescribe antibiotics for treatment of Reiter’s Syndrome. If patient is suffering from Conjunctivitis, doctor may recommend eye drops. Patient suffering from arthritis and other tissue related condition are normally prescribed painkillers. In case of swelling, doctor suggests some exercises and ointments for getting rid of the swell. The cases where the patient has been going through severe pain, doctor use steroid injected directly into the toes. It has been seen that after the treatment, normally the symptoms are suppressed, but may resurface in few months time for various reasons.

Prevention

In case of sexually transmitted diseases, it’s advisable to use precautions against transmission of the bacterial infection. Proper hygiene needs to be maintained. Food should be cooked properly to avoid bacterial infection which could save one from Diarrhoea. If person is already infected with the Reiter’s Syndrome, he needs to be even more conscious while making any sexual contacts with anyone.