Symptoms of Psoriatic Arthritis

Featuring Dr. Kam Shojania, MD, FRCPC

Duration: 1 minute, 45 seconds

So to diagnose psoriatic arthritis, one typically looks for the usual skin features of psoriasis, but what's interesting is people with psoriatic arthritis get fingernail or toenail changes with small pits. We call them nail pits.

People who have nail pits are more likely to get the arthritis portion of this psoriatic arthritis. So we look for the joints that are inflamed, we look for pain. People with psoriatic arthritis also get an unusual type of joint inflammation or inflammation called dactyliitis, the other term for this is sausage finger or sausage toe. It's an enlarged, painful, sausage-looking digit.

People with psoriatic arthritis also get inflammation where the tendons insert onto the bone, such as the heel, or around the elbow, or in the back area. So there's both joint skin and tendon involvement in people with psoriatic arthritis, and that's how we make the diagnosis because there is no specific blood test that will help us.

Psoriatic arthritis is diagnosed with typical symptoms of skin, joint, and tendon involvement. And the nice thing is if we catch it we can reverse the skin involvement and clear up about 90 percent of the skin, so it's very nice to be able to do that.

And in the joints we can actually prevent progression and damage of the joints if we catch it early. There are certain topical, oral, and injectable medications that can be used to manage psoriatic arthritis.

If you think you have psoriasis or psoriatic arthritis you need to ask your healthcare professional.

Presenter: Dr. Kam Shojania, Rheumatologist, Vancouver, BC

Local Practitioners: Rheumatologist