For sometime now, the cause for achy joints has been blamed on the weather conditions, it is quite interesting to note the fact that though, there are loads of data, the researchers have not yet been able to find a proper relationship between these factors, reveals a study conducted by the Harvard Medical School, which was published in The British Medical Journal.
The notion that certain symptoms and weather go hand in hand has persisted since antiquity. Hippocrates, writing in On Airs, Waters, and Places, exhorted those who wish to understand medicine to look at the changing seasons of the year and study the prevailing winds to see how the weather they bring affects health.
Do Joint Pain Increase During Rainy Days?
Individuals who suffer from joint pain believe that they can predict the weather based on their symptoms. However, rain days reduced the number of searches for joint pain.
Advertisement
‘There are lot of instances when people get joint aches during rainy seasons, but as the study pointed then there was no concrete evidence to show the link between the joint aches and weather conditions.’
Tweet it Now
The belief has endured over the centuries and well into the present, likely fuelled by a combination of folklore and small studies that have repeatedly yielded mixed results.
The newly published analysis led by Anupam Jena of Harvard Medical School's Department of Health Care Policy, used a "big data" approach, linking insurance claims from millions of doctor's visits with daily rainfall totals from thousands of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather stations.
![Don't Blame the Weather for Your Aches and Pains]( "Don't Blame the Weather for Your Aches and Pains")
New research from The George Institute for Global Health has revealed the weather plays no part in the symptoms associated with either back pain or osteoarthritis.
"No matter how we looked at the data, we didn't see any correlation between rainfall and physician visits for joint pain or back pain," said Jena, who is the Ruth L. Newhouse Associate Professor of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School and an internist at Massachusetts General Hospital. "The bottom line is: Painful joints and sore backs may very well be unreliable forecasters."
The study examined Medicare records of more than 11 million primary care office visits by older Americans between 2008 and 2012.
The research team asked a variety of questions: Did more patients seek care for back pain or joint pain when it rained or following periods of rainy weather? Were patients who went to the doctor for other reasons more likely to also report aching knees or backs around rainy days? What if there were several rainy days in a row? Even in the absence of a "rain effect" in the overall group, did patients with a prior diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis report more pain? The answers to all of these questions showed no meaningful link between joint pain and rainy weather. Overall, 6.35 percent of the office visits included reports of pain on rainy days, compared with 6.39 percent on dry days. So, are patients who believe there's a connection all wet?
"It's hard to prove a negative," Jena said, "but in this flood of data, if there was a clinically significant increase in pain, we would have expected to find at least some small, but significant, sign of the effect. We didn't."
The human brain is good at finding patterns, Jena noted, and these beliefs are often self-fulfilling. If you expect your knee to hurt when it rains and it doesn't, you forget about it, he said, but if it hurts and you blame it on the rain, it tends to stick in your mind. "As physicians, we should be sensitive to the things our patients are telling us. Pain is pain, with or without rain," Jena said. "But it's important to know that, at the clinical level, joint pain does not appear to ebb and flow with the weather."
Source: Eurekalert
Don't Blame the Weather for Your Aches and Pains
New research from The George Institute for Global Health has revealed the weather plays no part in the symptoms associated with either back pain or osteoarthritis.
Advertisement
"No matter how we looked at the data, we didn't see any correlation between rainfall and physician visits for joint pain or back pain," said Jena, who is the Ruth L. Newhouse Associate Professor of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School and an internist at Massachusetts General Hospital. "The bottom line is: Painful joints and sore backs may very well be unreliable forecasters."
The study examined Medicare records of more than 11 million primary care office visits by older Americans between 2008 and 2012.
The research team asked a variety of questions: Did more patients seek care for back pain or joint pain when it rained or following periods of rainy weather? Were patients who went to the doctor for other reasons more likely to also report aching knees or backs around rainy days? What if there were several rainy days in a row? Even in the absence of a "rain effect" in the overall group, did patients with a prior diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis report more pain? The answers to all of these questions showed no meaningful link between joint pain and rainy weather. Overall, 6.35 percent of the office visits included reports of pain on rainy days, compared with 6.39 percent on dry days. So, are patients who believe there's a connection all wet?
"It's hard to prove a negative," Jena said, "but in this flood of data, if there was a clinically significant increase in pain, we would have expected to find at least some small, but significant, sign of the effect. We didn't."
The human brain is good at finding patterns, Jena noted, and these beliefs are often self-fulfilling. If you expect your knee to hurt when it rains and it doesn't, you forget about it, he said, but if it hurts and you blame it on the rain, it tends to stick in your mind. "As physicians, we should be sensitive to the things our patients are telling us. Pain is pain, with or without rain," Jena said. "But it's important to know that, at the clinical level, joint pain does not appear to ebb and flow with the weather."
Source: Eurekalert
Shoulder Joint Pain may Indicate Risk of Cardiovascular Disease
If you are having shoulder problems, they may be due to some heart disease risk factors - not just physical strain, warns a new study.
Advertisement
 New Insights into Joint Pain TreatmentPeople over the age of 55 in the United States often complain about hip or knee pain. Simple lifestyle habits can reduce the strain placed on the joints. | Advertisement
|
Advertisement
Recommended Readings
Latest Lifestyle and Wellness News
The 'tight' sensation on your face after washing is explained by skin contraction in the outer layer.
The skin between the toes and behind the ears can harbor many harmful germs that can cause a variety of skin illnesses.
Prolonged sitting among office goers, pose risk of cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, hypertension, and certain types of cancers.
Yogurt's protein and fat content demonstrated its unidentified deodorizing properties against garlic's pungent odor.
People who smoke tobacco and cannabis have an increased risk of depression and anxiety than those who use either substance alone or not at all.
