Rheumatoid Arthritis

Inflammatory Arthritis

There are several different forms of inflammatory arthritis which can affect your feet in different ways.

Rheumatoid Arthritis affects many joints in your feet.
Reactive arthritis usually affects your ankle or the area around your heel. It may also affect your toes, causing pain and swelling. This is known as dactylitis or sausage toe.
Psoriatic arthritis often causes dactylitis.
Gout most commonly affects your big toe joint. It causes severe inflammation and makes your joint red, hot and swollen during an attack, which typically lasts 1–2 weeks. Without treatment, repeated attacks can cause permanent damage to your joint and lead to osteoarthritis. However, gout can usually be well controlled with medications.
Ankylosing Spondylitis mainly affects your spine but may also affect your heels.

Apart from problems in your joints, you may have inflammation and discomfort in the tendons and the other soft tissues in your feet. The part under or behind your heel where the tendons attach to your heel bone (your Achilles tendon) is quite often affected in this way.

Rheumatoid Arthritis can adversely affect tissues, organs and joints in the body. A large proportion of people with rheumatoid arthritis have the disease in their feet. This can cause pain, swelling, deformity and collapse of the foot's structure. Deformation in the foot can lead to several difficulties. Corns and callus may appear over points of high pressure causing pain. Swelling may mean a person can no longer wear their usual footwear style. The collapse of the structure of the foot may lead to a 'flat foot' that does not function well and leads to difficulty walking efficiently.

Flat foot can alter your entire gait and lead to pain in your foot, ankle and further up your legs and spine.

Your podiatrist aims to make your rheumatoid feet more comfortable by advising on suitable footwear and treating painful pressure areas with the removal of callus and corns. Orthotics can be provided to support the foot and help it to function better. Each of these things will allow you to remain as mobile as possible.