Rheumatoid arthritis risks
How likely am I to get rheumatoid arthritis or other inflammatory joint conditions?
Rheumatoid arthritis affects people of all ages - commonest age of onset is between 40 and 60 years (1,2,3), with one per cent of the population having the disease (4).
Men are three times more likely to develop ankylosing spondylitis than women. It usually develops in men aged 15 to 35 years (5).
For Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA), onset is usually seen at 16 years of age or earlier. Infection or heredity may be responsible. The prevalence of JIA is about six in 10,000 children, while the yearly incidence of JIA is about one per 10,000 children. (6).
Rheumatoid arthritis and employment
A 2007 UK-wide survey on employment by the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society (NRAS) questioned 782 people with rheumatoid arthritis.
Of those not working, around two-thirds (229 out of 353) stated they were not in employment due to their condition.
Over a quarter of these people had had to give up work within one year of diagnosis and nearly 60 per cent had had to give up work within six years (7).
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