We are offering one lucky visitor the chance to win a One Touch Jar Opener. Retailing at more than £25, this gadget is one of the best tools around for opening stubborn jar lids. Safe enough to use on any jar yet powerful enough to deal with the toughest jars it’s perfect for anyone who suffers from arthritis in their arms, wrists or hands

To be in with a chance of winning, all you have to do is complete our quick 5 minute survey. The competition is open to residents of the UK and Ireland and the closing date for receipt of entries is midnight Friday 5 March 2010. One lucky winner will be selected at random from all entries received and will be notified by email within 10 working days of the closing date.   Good Luck!

If you’ve been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, whether recently or in the past, then you may have found that the shock of diagnosis pretty soon turns into a desperate need for information.  Unfortunately, finding the right information can be difficult.  It’s true that there are some great websites out there, including NHS Choices, which has a comprehensive section on RA,  and of course you should have come away from your rheumatology department weighed down with literature to browse at your leisure.  None of these though, have the personal touch that you get from reading other people’s day to day experiences of living with rheumatoid arthritis.

Recently there has been a big surge in the number of RA bloggers out there, each with a slightly different take on how it feels to live with a chronic illness.  I follow many avidly and have learnt so much through doing so.  Here are a few of my favourite RA bloggers, but let us know if there’s anyone we’ve missed.

RA Warrior - A really comprehensive and frequently updated site which contains all you could ever want to know about the reality of living with RA

RA Guy - Living with RA from a male perspective this time.  The blog includes real profiles of people with RA and an excellent 60 second guide

Synovial Syntax - a British blog from a parent with a real sense of humour (and RA). 

Pollyanna Penguin - Another British blog finding reasons to be cheerful when living with a chronic illness

Single Gal’s Guide to RA - One woman, one crazy city and a chronic disease….

And of course, no mention of the RA community would be complete without including the fabulous forums that exist on the Arthritis Care website and the amazing work done by the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society.

The panic surrounding the Swine Flu pandemic shows no sign of abating. To date I have received two letters from my daughters school informing me of confirmed swine flu cases (will I be getting one a day soon?). I can barely leave the house without running the risk of being sneezed, coughed or otherwise spluttered on.

As an RA sufferer, what is to be made of all this? Like many people with inflammatory arthritis I take DMARDs, and like many I am concerned about the effect of Swine Flu on my compromised immune system. It’s unclear at the moment whether all RA patients will be eligible for the Swine Flu jab, but so far no gilt-edged invitation has arrived in my letterbox!

What happens if one of my family goes down with Swine Flu - I can hardly avoid them for seven days.  Should I continue with treatment?  Will I need Tamiflu?  There are so many questions yet so little real information, which is why I was so pleased to receive a tweet from Arthritis Ireland telling me about a great Swine Flu downloadable factsheet put together by the Irish Society for Rheumatology. It’s full of really useful information and well worth a look.

A report published yesterday by the National Audit Office (NAO) found that previous estimates of the number of Rheumatoid Arthritis sufferers in the UK may have been vastly underestimated.  Chris Groom, audit manager for the report said:

“We estimate that 580,000 adults in England have the condition, which is higher than existing estimates of 400,000 for the UK, and that there are 26,000 new cases each year in England, compared to existing estimates of 12,000 for the UK”. 

These figures are truly staggering and even more worrying when you consider that previous estimates took into account the whole of the UK and not just England. 

The report detailed a number of other findings, including:

•  20% of people with RA delayed seeking treatment for more than a year
• 18% of patients visited their GP more than 8 times before they were diagnosed with RA
• 60% of GPs do not use specific guidance or criteria to help them diagnose RA
• 20% of RA patients felt they had received insufficient information about continuing employment after diagnosis
• 3/4 of Primary Care Trusts have not assessed the number of people with RA in their area

The National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society (NRAS) responded to the report by calling for a campaign to increase public awareness of rheumatoid arthritis.  Ailsa Bosworth, Chief Executive and Founder of NRAS said:

“A public awareness campaign like those undertaken to tackle other common chronic diseases would make the public, health professionals and commissioners aware of the urgent need for specialist treatment to prevent rapid irreversible joint damage that can lead to permanent disability and often loss of employment”

Revised estimates suggest that RA costs the NHS £560 million a year, with an additional cost to the economy of around £1.8 billion through sick leave and work-related disability.  With costs like this, any campaign which improves access to early diagnosis and treatment is without doubt a necessary and essential investment.

In a recent UK survey carried out by Wyeth Pharmaceuticals and supported by the NRAS, 575 rheumatoid arthritis sufferers were questioned about the impact of RA on their lives.  The results put into sharp focus the major impact that a diagnosis of RA can have; more than 94% of respondents claimed that the condition compromised their independence in some way, with more than 60% saying that their independence was compromised significantly.  Nearly half of those questioned claimed that earlier treatment would have made them more independent today.

These results suggest that the message of early and aggressive treatment of RA is still not getting through.  This is a subject dear to my heart, having experienced at close hand the patchy nature of NHS provision for newly diagnosed rheumatoid arthritis patients.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that rheumatology clinics may be fast-tracking ”new” patients” in order to meet government targets.  Once seen, these patients become “old patients” and go to the bottom of the clinic list, waiting months for the next appointment when treatment will begin.  This chimes with my own experience; seen in January the consultant asked me to return 4 months later with a view to starting treatment.  This 4 month appointment date turned into an appointment 6 months later and very nearly (had I not complained) into one 12 months after my initial consultation. 

This is clearly madness, early and aggressive treatment should be a right not an aspiration.  It is without doubt the only route for all concerned.  With estimates placing the direct and indirect costs of RA to the nation at around £4.5billion, much of that due to lost productivity,  it’s time for the money men at the government and frontline NHS staff to get together and engage in a little joined-up thinking.

News came yesterday of a drug trial which coud radically change the way newly-diagnosed rheumatoid arthritis patients are treated.  Current NICE guidelines for the treatment of early RA recommend agressive treatment with a combination of disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs).  Anti-TNF biologics can be offerered if DMARD treatment fails, with rituximab as back up should the Anti-TNFs be ineffective.

However, a recent trial led by Professor Paul-Peter Tak from the University of Amsterdam is set to turn this “gold standard” of treatment on its head.  The study took 755 patients who had been recently diagnosed with RA and had sufferered for less than a year.  These patients were treated with a combination of methotrexate (a DMARD) and rituximab - a drug that was originally developed to treat leukaemia.  The results were startling, of the patients receiving this therapy 30.5% experienced a significant reduction in symptoms compared with just 12.5% of patients who were taking just methotrexate.  What’s more, this treatment was significantly less expensive than Anti-TNF drug treatment.

The results of this study have the potential to change people’s lives. Let’s hope that NICE sits up and pays attention soon.

When you are first diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis the last thing you worry about is how much it’s going to cost.  But cost it does.  Days off work, assistive devices and prescription charges all quickly mount up until you begin to wonder just how you can afford  to have RA.

At the moment certain conditions are eligible for free prescriptions.  These conditions include epilepsy, diabetes, hypoparathyroidism and cancer.  Pregnant women are exempt from paying for their prescriptions throughout pregnancy and for a year after birth.  So why not Rheumatoid Arthritis?

RA is a chronic and often progressive disease.  Sufferers have to take a cocktail of drugs - some to deal with the condition itself and others to counter the side-effects of these drugs; depression can come hand-in-hand with RA - adding yet more medication to the monthly bill. 

Yet given a choice between putting food on the table and paying for medication, which would you choose?  There is evidence that some people are having to make exactly these choices, putting themselves at grave risk of serious joint damage and storing up a whole heap of expense for the NHS.  That’s why it is essential that prescription charges are abolished for sufferers of Rheumatoid Arthritis, it’s not only good for us, but it’s good for the NHS too.

The government is currently reviewing prescription charges and the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society (NRAS) is campaigning for free prescriptions for all RA sufferers.  Funky Arthur supports this campaign.  What can you do?

1. Email your MP and ask for their support - go to www.parliament.co.uk, click on ‘MPs and Lords’ then click on ‘members of parliament by constituency’ to find your MPs details
2. Visit www.prescriptionpromise.org who are campaigning for free prescriptions for all who suffer with a long-term condition and sign their petition.
3. Join the Facebook causes group by following this link http://apps.facebook.com/causes/269885/11236118?m=fe50b0e9
4. If you have had problems paying for your prescriptions, then the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society are looking for case studies.  Follow this link http://www.rheumatoid.org.uk/article.php?article_id=636.