What is Rheumatoid Arthritis? X-ray!

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:00:06] All right, so everyone, welcome. For those of you who are new, for those of you that this is your first time, and for those of you, those of you who have been with us the whole time, this is Humpday conversations number twenty-seven. I’m Dr. Boudreau and my partner is Dr. Clayton Roach. And we do this segment each and every Wednesday night at 9:00 p.m. live on Facebook. This week we are talking about rheumatoid arthritis. It’s an autoimmune, chronic, systemic, inflammatory condition and it targets the synovial joints.

Anything that has synovial fluid within the joint, which is most of the joints in your body. So it’s a widespread condition. The incidence of this condition, impacts almost 293,000 Canadians like 293,000 Canadians are suffering from RA at this very minute. And so what do you think of that? No, I honestly thought it was going to be much higher than that.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:01:07] Yeah, you know what? Well, here’s I think what the reason is. A lot of times when people. We tend to think that way because I think a lot of people confuse rheumatoid arthritis with degenerative osteoarthritis, so the motor is kind of get thrown around. And all I’ve got I’ve got rheumatoid. Well, they don’t actually have rheumatoid. They have osteoarthritis. But I think because with a lot of people mix those two words up, that it can seem like a lot more people have rheumatoid, but definitely have thought that there was going to be more than that. And definitely, we’re talking about females, again

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:01:42] And the incidence of this. Right. It’s the most common inflammatory condition. And so, you know, for something that’s got such a low incidence, it’s the most common one. It’s usually more common among females and usually peaks between the ages of 20 and 60. So a pretty large age gap there between 40 and 50. It targets the most common and it can also target children. We call that juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. And so females targeted two to one in terms of incidence.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:02:15] Yeah. So even in a juvenile, these women are more commonly affected by juvenile arthritis, two to one. So, yeah, definitely women again, women again.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:02:28] So the signs And symptoms are we’re just going to jump right into it here. So typically it’s variable, right? There are flares and then there are remissions. The onset is insidious, right? It’s an autoimmune inflammatory condition. The cause is really unknown at this point. Why? They tend to think that there is an environmental or there’s genetic link with this particular condition. So you’ll present with swelling. There won’t be redness, but you will have flu-like symptoms. So if we look at the x rays here and if we look at the photo furthest to the left there, that’s a pretty common-looking picture there. This is what rheumatoid arthritis commonly looks like in the fingers. Clayton, what do you think of that?

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:03:17] So basically, people present with their hands turn inwards. If you’re if your palms up, the hands turn inwards. And there’s a very common, very, very common presentation and also pain in the wrists and joints. And one of the things that happen with rheumatoid arthritis is things will be happening on both sides, very symmetrical. So as it starts to progress, you’ll start noticing pain, both wrists, both knees, spine on both sides. So this is very, very, very what we call Pathognomonic for rheumatoid arthritis is to present bilateral both sides very symmetrical.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:04:01] Mm hmm. Yeah. And so whenever it happens and we can look to the x-ray and this is a pretty complex x-ray, but you can see how all of those little carpal bones, all the little bones that make up your hands here, they’re all squished together. Right. The ligaments begin to lose that laxity in the synovial joints in between those bones, they’re beginning to break down in a row due to the inflammatory nature of this particular condition. So when we talk about in all our previous conversations, when we talked about the kinetic chain and the, you know, the importance of structure, you basically lose that structure inside that risk. There are eight bones in the wrist. And here you can see that it doesn’t really look like a bone.

It just seems like a big mess of those eight bones being stuck together because the ligaments are now very, very lax and the bones are just kind of like sitting in the Sobeys bag and they’re kind of allowed to move wherever they want. So there is no stability. And we’re going to talk a little more about that, about the instability and how it can actually affect your neck as well. Yeah, and I mean, if you look to these x rays, we can see how the fingers and especially at that joint. Right. The proximal to the pharyngeal joint is completely eroded. The alignment of the joint is off.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:05:28] There’s very little joint space and synovial fluid left in that joint to help protect those joints there. And so it begins to happen is the alignment starts to start to become out of place and those fingers begin to lose that structure. And the really funny part about this condition where you’re going to say a point there

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:05:50] no, no, no. I was just going to show them what normal was supposed to look like. When you see the disc space here, like this is not normal, but it’s closer to normal than what this one is. There’s total destruction of that space right there, right?

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:06:03] Yeah. And I was just going to mention, you know, it destructs those hip joints. Right. And it also destructs the MCPs, which is the closest joint to all those little carpal bones. But it spares the joint furthest away. So it always spares in rheumatoid arthritis. I shouldn’t say always because there’s never always one hundred percent. But commonly in this condition, it will spare the joints furthest up. And so if we just look towards me here for a moment, so it will charge this joint right here. It will also attack this joint but it will spare this furthest joint away, which is very interesting, and so we’ll touch a little bit more on this particular topic a little later in the presentation. But it’s interesting that it’ll spare these particular joints and target these more.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:06:57] Yeah, one of the things that’s also common rheumatoid arthritis is actually osteoporosis. And unfortunately. One of the things that reduce inflammation is cortisone, so cortisone, if you take it either through injections or whatever, reduces the inflammation, which makes some of the pain better, but then cortisone leaches calcium away from the bone. So now your osteoporosis is worsening because you’re taking something that, you know, alleviates the pain but now compounds, even more, the issue with osteoporosis, which could end up being fatal if you fracture your hip, your femur. So definitely not something that you want to overdo on the cortisone side.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:07:50] Absolutely. And that’s a great point because this condition can impact not only the hands, it’s a systemic, inflammatory condition. So it’ll impact the elbows on the shoulder and particularly the distal clavicle, the hips, the knees, and of course, the spine. More importantly, in the cervical area, which we’ll touch on later on in the presentation. I mean, don’t be fooled. Like rheumatoid arthritis is a brutal, brutal disease, like we’re thinking. And just this has come to light. I don’t know for how long now, but it’s now known that rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disorder.

A lot of the things that we do to treat the pain don’t necessarily treat the immune disorder. Right. So these are the definition of the autoimmune disorders that the body’s attacking itself. So, again, no multifactor, a multifactorial problem, and a multifaceted approach is needed. And nutrition-wise, you know, reducing the amount of information that you’re introducing your body through nutrition as well. Yeah, so slide number three, this is a topic as well that we wanted to touch on just to shed some light on the differences between osteoarthritis or OA and rheumatoid arthritis or RA. Clayton did you want to get going on this topic.

Osteoarthritis VS Rheumatoid Arthritis

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:09:08] So let’s pull the audience right now. So for those of you who are here live and those of you who are listening to this tomorrow, which one do you think is rheumatoid arthritis, The one on the right, the two hands on the right, or the two hands on the left? So just put in the comment section L for left or are for right. We’ll give you five minutes, 30 seconds to do this. Yeah.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:09:40] I mean this, this is well and you guys are thinking about it. So I’m just gonna fill some of this gap here. But you know, this is a very difficult question to answer. We don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, but if I could give help, give a little bit of a hint, I would just look to the Capos and the risks. I would look to the bone of the bone. All right. OK. Yeah, so I would look to the ulna, I would look to the radius as well, I would look to the radial head, see how dark it is compared to how maybe radial opaque it is, because remember, in this condition, it’s very common to have osteoporosis along with that.

Yeah. OK, thank you all for tuning in to the reveal. So osteoarthritis will be on the left-hand side and rheumatoid arthritis will be on the right. I just want to bring everyone’s attention so let’s look at the radius, right, let’s look at the radius on the RA side. And let’s compare it to that radius on the OA side. Sure. So we just want to look at the radio-opacity of that bone right.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:11:16] So, guys, let me just point out, you see how this is a skin over here, this is the borders of the skin and look how gray the skin is because there is no bone there. And when you take a look at the bone, this is the radius. And by the way, look at how bright white. This is here and how grey this bone is on the inside. OK. So. This is what we’re talking about here with osteoporosis. That is almost as grey as the skin and the bones should be white. Now, when you look over here on the osteoarthritic side. This bone looks very healthy. In terms of the whiteness of it, right?

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:12:08] Yeah, exactly, and that’s what I wanted to point out, the OA example that we gave here isn’t exactly the best example of unilateral non-symmetrical. Right. Because osteoarthritis, normally impacts one side versus impacts both. And usually the symmetry of degeneration is is is non-symmetrical. And what that means is that if you’re wearing down one part of a bone, it’s going to wear out in that direction. Right. Whereas if we look on the other side of the coin and look at rheumatoid arthritis, it’s bilateral. So it means it impacts both sides and it’s symmetrical. And so the entire joint surface will erode and break down. It’s completely uniform, right. Whereas OA it’s more of a degenerative process based on either trauma or structural issues.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:13:05] And even if you look at the carpal area. So this is the carpal area here, guys, and this is the metacarpal over here. So when you look at the Capillary, you can see the borders of the eight bones here. When you look at this one, they’re really gray. And you cannot define the borders of the eight bones here when you look at the hip joint right over here. The proximal one and you look at this one over here. There is destruction there, so there is a big difference between rheumatoid arthritis and the amount of destruction of that joint, and as Ben noted, if you look at the most distal joint right here.

It looks 100 percent healthy. Right, yeah, exactly. So that’s the Distel joint, that spirit in rheumatoid arthritis, and here it is looking pretty shady. And this one doesn’t look even better. It’s on both sides. Yeah. So, yeah.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:14:10] Yeah. And I mean, this condition, rheumatoid arthritis, just to draw some more comparisons between the two osteoarthritides normally develops later in later stages. Right. Or if there’s trauma in some type of process that may have led to that degeneration to occur, whereas rheumatoid arthritis can attack almost any age. We talked about it being in people less than 16 years old and kids up to six years of age. Also, we have to think about the inflammatory process and the rheumatological aspect of the disease, and how people can present with muscle wasting fatigue fevers. So there are other things to consider, not just the X-ray, although they are very, very important when it comes to the diagnosis of the condition.

Rheumatoid Arthritis Neck X-ray!

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:14:57] Yeah, and only only to mention to mention as well the the flare ups with the rheumatoid arthritis, which doesn’t typically occur with degenerative joints in osteoarthritis. Now, just as much is trauma and overuse can cause osteoarthritis as we all know if you don’t use it or lose it as well. So not enough movement can create degeneration as well. Right. And rheumatoid arthritis just doesn’t care. Right. It’s an autoimmune disorder. And whether you move or not, the joints start to deteriorate. So there’s definitely a bigger impact with rheumatoid arthritis in terms of the overall your overall health.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:15:40] Yes, so we talked about how eventually this condition will begin to impact the spine and where does it impact? It usually is in the neck, in the cervical spine. It doesn’t normally attack the lumbar spine or the thoracic spine, which is another mystery with this condition. Why does it want to go to the cervical spine? So when it does affect the cervical spine, it normally impacts the upper two vertebrae, so C1 and C2. Did you want to touch on the synovial joint?

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:16:15] Yeah, I mean, in what aspect, like the synovial joint, like the lining of the synovial joint, which all the Forsett joints, they’re all synovial joints and what happens, the lining of the joint is where the pain-sensing fibers are. And when you start to have erosion of the synovial aligning, that’s what creates the pain. Right. So when we talk about gradient experience, a thoracic spine, most of the time, lumbar spine and then in the neck, it affects a very specific area, as we alluded to in the beginning, the upper cervical spine, C1, and C2. So go ahead and talk about this Ben and I’ll talk about the anatomy on the side there.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:17:00] Yeah. So C1 and C2 have a very close articulation. OK, so C1. This is C1, right. C1 sits on top of C2 C2 ends, it’s like a big stick that goes up through the center of C1 and it acts as a stabilization point so that C1 can turn on top of C2.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:17:28] So annotate this here, so C1 called the Atlas is right here. So this is C1, right? It’s around the vertebra And then C2 has what’s called a den that looks like a round finger sticking up through the atlas, which is held in there by a bunch of ligaments. One called the transverse ligament. And then you’ve got these synovial cavities which are inside right here, and basically, it keeps that C2 where it’s supposed to be. Now, guys sitting right here. Is going to be your spinal cord. Right. Go ahead, Ben.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:18:22] Yeah, and so with a process like rheumatoid arthritis that attacks the synovial joints, it’ll begin to attack that joint between and C1 and C2. What will happen is that the inflammatory process will begin to destroy that joint as well as begin to erode the dens. What they found in a lot of findings with x rays and rheumatoid arthritis is it will cause what we call subchondral sclerosis. The inflammatory process will begin to break apart the cartilage on the surface of the bone and eventually the synovial fluid will seep into the bone. Then what happens is an erosion process will begin to develop. And so that bone will start to actually break down and become osteoporotic.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:19:21] Now, when you move your head forward and backwards, the reason this C2 Does not come back and hit into the spinal cord, it’s because it’s checked by this posterior ligament now or sorry, this transverse ligament now with rheumatoid arthritis, you start to have more laxity there. So what happens? People with rheumatoid arthritis. If you get into a car accident with a whiplash injury, this is Dens can come right back and concuss the spinal cord. So we need at times when people have rheumatoid arthritis, to take an x-ray and measure the width of that space between C1 and C2 right in through there. OK, so go ahead and explain some of these x rays there. Ben.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:20:18] Yeah. So if we start further to the left, it would definitely direct us a little bit more to what the process would look like on x-ray if that Dens were eroded and destroyed and that AR ligament was gone. And so really the ADI, which is the space that’s supposed to be between the front of C2 and the dens, it’s supposed to be between three and five millimeters in adults. But anything greater than five millimeters is considered instability, and so in a condition like, RA, you would have instability if that see one secure area was eroded enough. And that’s what the x-ray is trying to speak to here.

As you can see in the x-ray to the left, that’s a reflection view. It’s quite small here on the image, but that’s a reflection. They take the x-ray with the head bent forward. And what that’s meant to do, it’s meant to slide that scene forward. And so space will then increase if that Dens were eroded. So there you can see how large it is. I think it reads. What’s it read there? Almost. It’s anyway, even when it’s extended at the photo to the right, it still reads 22 so 22 centimeters. So that’s 22 millimeters. You’re not supposed to have greater than five.

Right. So that’s a pretty incredible finding. And that’s shown that there’s quite a bit of laxity and instability in that area. Yeah, on the MRI here, you can see this is the dens right here. I’m just going to outline C2 right here. And this is C1, the front part. And this is the space right here. So what I’ll do here is I’ll just erase it now that you know what you’re looking at and. That is the space that we are talking about. Right. They’re. That’s a great picture there.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:22:31] Yeah, and you can even see how the top of that Denzil’s is eroded as well. Yeah, it’s supposed to go up a little bit further than that. But the top is is quite right. And then that third image, as well as an arrow, is an eroded dance. And so it’s got a very sharp top to that to that C2 dens process.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:22:58] Yes, so, again, this is a lot of information, guys, but this is chiropractors, it’s one of the things that we look at for your safety because as we’re doing a neck adjustment, we need to know how stable C2 is in reference to C1 and to make sure that there isn’t that movement too much movement so that we actually could create some problems for the spinal cord that sits right behind that C2.

So, guys, if you have a chance, just give us just a little bit of a heart here to make sure that, you know, you guys are enjoying this and you actually have learned something hard or a thumbs up doesn’t really matter because this can be a little bit of complex information here. And again, you know, for a condition that is complex, it is also complex to explain what is going on and all the things that we need to look at and learn. Right. Thanks, guys. Yeah.

Diagnosing Rheumatoid Arthritis

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:23:54] And also, if you’re enjoying the conversation so far, don’t forget to like and share the conversation, and especially if you know someone who has this condition, who might be looking for answers, definitely feel free to share. All right, so when it comes to diagnosis, x-ray findings are one of the top things that anyone will do. They’ll commonly send you for an x-ray and look to see if the findings on the x-ray correlate with that on the physical exam. Yeah.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:24:31] Physical examination,

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:24:33] Yeah, yeah, physical exam findings, we’re looking for bilateral symmetrical, we’re also looking for fever, sore musculature, we’re looking for redness.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:24:46] And so we’re looking with rheumatoid but probably is the biggest thing is going to be the health history. Right. A lot of description of pain. Both sides and all that stuff is going to start to lead us down the path that when you’re doing your physical examination, you pretty much already have a large hunch that this is rheumatoid arthritis, that laboratory tests the rheumatoid factor will be positive in about seventy ninety-five percent of the cases. So it’s not a hundred percent safe to just go by the rheumatoid factor. And by the way, this is not done on a regular series or just a regular blood panel. It needs to be selected above and beyond, just regular blood work. So definitely the RF, the rheumatoid factor is one of them. Go ahead, Ben.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:25:36] Yeah, I was also going to list this anti-CPP and so this is a blood test that we learned about in chiropractic college and it’s a newer test. It measures the level of specific antibodies that are more specific and it tends to be elevated in people with RA or those that are about to develop. It’s used as a predictor to help tell early on. Somebody has a higher incidence of developing the condition versus somebody else. And they’d also look at ESR, which is Erythrocyte sedimentation rate and C reactive proteins. And so these are inflammatory markers and we’re looking to see if the body’s more inflamed as within an inflammatory condition as well. The individual might below and have some anemia there.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:26:23] Yeah, and this would be because of the autoimmune component to it, the anemia. So, yeah, so definitely as the case unfolds, laboratory tests are sometimes needed in order to confirm this, but by the time we do laboratory tests, you know, at least the patient has some kind of inflammatory arthritis. You might not be sure as to which one it was like last week we talked about ankylosing spondylitis, maybe lupus or psoriatic arthritis. But definitely, you’re confirming that with a lot of this testing. For us, you know, in terms of chiropractic care, one of the things that we want to do is can help with is reducing some of the pain, improving joint mobility and function.

Treating Rheumatoid Arthritis

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:27:12] And if you maintain structure. It is fathomable that you might be able to minimize further damage if you compare the person that has been in Roach Chiropractic Centre to a person that has a bit of chiropractic care and both had rheumatoid, I would like to think that the person who is maintaining their structure might have less deterioration of those joints over time in the same period of time. But definitely chiropractic. And I’ve seen many patients with rheumatoid arthritis. The only thing is you want to avoid treating during a full-blown flare up. So and the patient is usually going to be able to tell you that they’re in a full-blown therapy or all the lab values have shot up and they’re in a state of inflammation, inflammation.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:27:59] Yeah, and so definitely something to consider when you’re treating patients like this or if you are a patient on the flareup day with this condition, it’s important to get the rest, especially during a flare-up day. But when you’re having a good day, it’s all about maintaining healthy body weight. So you want to be able to take if you are overweight, for instance, because in this condition, you can be either on one side of the coin or the other side of the coin. If you are if you have this condition, you want to maintain a healthy weight. If you are underweight, you want to maintain the structure and strength in those joints.

Strengthening the muscles around the joints, because in a condition like this, it’s very easy for muscles to waste away. At which point the ligaments will also waste away and the joints then have no support. That inflammatory condition is going to continue to take over. Also exercising moderate stretching and strengthening, keep the ligaments and tendons flexible and strong, and alternate between heavy and light exercises. And then remember, you know, like Ben mentioned, moderate exercise, mild to moderate, remember that this condition tends to cause osteoporosis. So one of the things that you want to do is you want to do weight-bearing exercises,

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:29:22] But you also don’t want to do too much where you’re inflaming the joints. Definitely doing weight-bearing exercise, weight, resistance type of exercise is going to be useful. Making sure that you take advantage of the days where you’re not inflamed, you’re able to move. And that’s going to be very, very helpful in managing this chronic condition.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:29:48] Yeah, exactly. And so conventional therapies, I’m just going to touch on it. So conventional medical therapies, corticosteroids like we talked about earlier, joint replacing, disease-modifying antiemetic drugs like methotrexate. It would be a very common medication prescribed to patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Just be aware of the side effects of these particular conditions, especially when it comes to steroids. And that’s where with corticosteroids we talked about earlier, the risk of osteoporosis and methotrexate is an immunosuppressive agent. So when you’re on a particular condition like this, it may increase your incidence of sickness because your immune system is compromised at that point. Yeah.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:30:39] Yeah, so some of the side effects from methotrexate, liver problems, dizziness, headaches, hair loss, decreased appetite, lymphoma, birth defects, lung issues. Brain fog. So and I mean, there’s no shortage of people on methotrexate. So and again, I understand what they’re trying to do is correct the immune problem. But again, that does come with a whole host of issues as well that come from that.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:31:08] Yeah. And so, you know, it’s not that we are saying here at all that chiropractic can be a direct replacement for the medications that you’re taking for this condition. We’re here to simply help improve the quality of life as well as reduce the pain on the joints and, you know, some of the side effects of this particular condition, some of the things that are happening, there might be a lot of things going on that are not rheumatoid arthritis. Some of the other things could be due to other issues. Right. And so we’re trying to discover that and unravel this. This is not to try to untie a few things.

And then once we untie it, we get to the center. And that’s the maybe that’s the RA at the center and everything was just probably around it. We just want to try and unravel it a little bit more.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:31:59] And I mean, it’s understandable when you have a condition like RA when everything starts to hurt, to think that everything is because of RA. And what Ben was saying is that when you start treatment, when we start fixing a few things that aren’t related to RA, you realize that you can actually live with less pain than you were in because some of the things that were causing the pain were not from RA were actually being able to be fixed through chiropractic and perhaps your physiotherapist or other things that we can do. So this is definitely a condition we want to manage.

I don’t like drugs, but drugs do work. And at one point something’s got to give. And everybody has a threshold as to how much they can handle seeing their lives changing, the quality of life going down. So I always say the least amount possible because sometimes having pain is a great thing because it’s your check engine light that says, hey, you know, I’m in pain. So it gives you the ability to know that you’re doing too much and to stop it gives you that checkpoint where if you obliterate that checkpoint, you could easily do too much. And then the next day you’re in pain and then you need more antiinflammatory used to combat the pain because you did too much to be before. So you can kind of get into that pattern where it’s just not going to be. Yeah.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:33:18] Yeah. So as we always do, we’re going to end with a settlement of the month, we talked about this last time, and very, very pertinent for this time around as well, is the omega three from NUTRASEA. This is obviously an antiinflammatory product that does a great, very, very high-quality product from NUTRASEA. We talked about the omega 3s can become the fish oils that can become rancid just because of the process that they have to go from the point where the fish get caught to the point where it’s in a bottle. There’s that process can be long and sometimes too long because what happens, the fish oils sit into a big tank and they get exposed to oxygen.

And that oxidative process turns this beautiful fish oil and it becomes rancid. So when you break open a pill or capsule, it smells and it smells like sometimes down-home in Cheticamp where they had them, they used to process fish and it was it didn’t smell that great. So if you’re burping that fish oil and it doesn’t sit well, that is one hundred percent, not a great product. You should not be burping your fish oil. It shouldn’t be coming back. So, yeah, a great, great product. Do you want to add anything to that Ben?

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:34:43] Yeah, I was just going to say, you know, it’s all about the quality of the supplements that you’re looking into. And so we’re recommending a quality Omega three supplement there. And so definitely do your research and say that the nutritional products are really good. Very, very good, well tested. Some testing is done even here in Nova Scotia. So supporting local at the same time. Yeah. So we had a question. So it’s rheumatoid arthritis. Is it hereditary? So here’s the thing. They don’t know the cause of the condition.

They say that there is a higher incidence among family members, but not everyone gets the condition. And so they’re not sure how it’s related and in terms of the cause. And so I wouldn’t just hang my hat on thinking that I’m going to get this because my grandmother or my mother had it. I would continue to lead a happy, healthy lifestyle. If you know that inflammatory condition is prone in your family, why not look into foods that are antiinflammatory right. Foods that help to reduce that incidence to be proactive and be proactive in your care?

Epigenetics and Rheumatoid Arthritis

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:35:59] Yeah, no, I agree so many times With that in the back of our heads that We’re going to be the Product of our family. And that’s not necessarily true most of the time, actually. And most of the time it’s not genetic. It’s called epigenetic where we may have that genetic makeup. But those genes have to be expressed in the way to get expresses by flipping the switch, by living an unhealthy lifestyle and all that stuff that you shouldn’t be doing. And all of a sudden that gene gets expressed. That’s called epigenetics. Well, just as the light can be on, it can also be turned off. So genes don’t necessarily predict the future.

They are there. They’re almost ripe for the picking, almost like, You know, an opportunistic virus or bacteria that’s there. As soon as your immune system goes down, it takes over. When you don’t live a healthy lifestyle, then you become your genetic makeup. But that was almost a choice, right? So don’t live in the back here with that in the back of your head that you’re going to be a byproduct of the genetic makeup of your family or your second generation, third generation. That is not always the case.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:37:13] Self-fulfilling prophecies can definitely be a weakness. They talk a little bit about no Sibos. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In this podcast that I listened to a while back, Deepak Chopra, Deepak Chopra is talking about the incidence of Sibos and how, you know, if you believe that something is going to happen if you believe that you’re going to be worse off if you’re in a condition where people are telling you and they’re conditioned to believe this certain way, you’re going to believe that and you’re going to have the outcome that no outcome that you don’t want.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:37:49] Yeah, it’s almost that way if you think you’re going to be healthy or you think you’re going to be sick, you’re right both ways. Right. So sometimes there’s a lot to be said about your mental state and how that creates actions. So, guys, I hope you enjoyed this. Definitely one of the more complex subjects that we’ve talked about. So if you could just please, you know, at this point, just pause and you know. Share this information, share this episode with your friends and colleagues, that would be fantastic, Ben what else?

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:38:25] That is I believe that is everything. I mean, this is everything we have for the Humpday conversation for tonight. So just to wrap things up or just like to say thank you to all those who have watched tonight, all those who have been watching from the beginning, and those who are new. Thank you for joining us tonight.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:38:42] Thank you so much for being there tonight. Again, always appreciated. It would be kind of boring just being you and I have been again and nobody being live. So thank you so much for being there. And we really appreciate the comments that you guys leave us. We read every single one of them and we also reply. So thanks.

Dr. Ben Boudreau: [00:39:03] Thank you, guys. Thanks again.

Dr. Clayton Roach: [00:39:05] Perfect, so we’ll see you guys next week live on a Humpday conversation on Facebook. Next weekend, Wednesday, nine o’clock. If you’re listening to us on YouTube, make sure you click subscribe at the very top. And if you’re listening to us on Facebook tomorrow morning, thank you so much for listening in. And we will see you soon. Thanks, guys. What’s up? Listen, if you like this episode, you’ll probably like the other ones are pretty good. So here’s what you need to do. You need to like us and follow us on Facebook. Following means you get notified when these two guys are alive.

Next, family, friends, you need to share these episodes because you never know. You might help them because they need this information as well. And guys, if you ever miss an episode, make sure you subscribe to us on YouTube. That way, you can watch the episode over and over and over again. Guys, we love you and appreciate you. Take care.