This is a transcript of a Dr. Jay Show broadcast on 1560TheGame, which discusses arthritis of the hand. Dr. J. Michael Bennett is a Board Certified Orthopedic Surgeon and a Fellowship Trained Sports Medicine Physician serving patients from Katy, Fort Bend County, Metro Houston and Southeast Texas from offices in Houston, near the Galleria and Sugar Land, TX. Call 281-633-8600 for an appointment.
Here’s the summary of the first portion of the Show:
Dr. J. Michael Bennett: My name is Dr. J. Michael Bennett and I am an orthopedic surgeon practicing in the Greater Houston area, primarily out in Sugar Land.
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| A hand affected by rheumatoid arthritis (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
I did my training at Baylor College of Medicine, and that was followed by a fellowship at the University of Miami where I spent some time with the Buccaneers as well as with the Hurricanes, after which I headed back here to Houston and set up shop and I’ve been in practice now for about six years. My specialty is shoulders, elbows, knees, sports medicine, just a little bit of everything in general.
The show here is basically about general orthopedics and wellness and sports medicine but the idea is to really inform and update you guys and clarify some of these misunderstandings, myths and misconceptions regarding sports medicine and wellness and to hopefully give you a little bit of ammunition, a little bit of information, that will make you an informed consumer. When you go into a particular doctor’s office, everything’s a little bit different from one to the other, and you have to make sure that you know that doctor’s background and that he or she is an expert in the area you want to have treated and has the necessary experience. So always do your due diligence and always be aware that you have options regarding your health and well being.
Today we have a great show for you guys. I first want to throw our phone number out there, 281-633-8600, and we welcome all callers. For the next hour we’ll be talking about hand pain and hand injuries, specifically, but we’re of course happy to answer any question you have regarding orthopedic or sports injuries or issues and we can give you a little bit of advice on. Our special guest today is Dr. Alan Rodgers, who is our hand specialist, and he practices in the Katy area. Dr. Rodgers, welcome to the show, we appreciate you coming in. Share with us your background, your training and how patients can get in touch with you.
Dr. Alan Rodgers: I’m a Houston native and did my medical school right here at UT and then did a plastic surgery residency. I get a lot of questions about that, why plastic surgery and hand surgery go hand in hand. But all plastic surgeons are trained in hand and some of us choose to pursue it more and I actually did a hand fellowship here at Baylor College of Medicine and I devote a significant portion of my practice to hand injury and trauma.
Dr. J. Michael Bennett: Actually I’ve known Dr. Rodgers for awhile and I can tell you that he’s definitely qualified to take care of your hands. We’re going to talk about some general issues regarding hands today and any kind of hand pain and first off we want to talk about different types of pain. When you break this down it doesn’t necessarily fall into one category, there’s a number of different categories: arthritic, neurologic, traumatic, and then infection, and we’ll kind of go through each one of these and give you some basic information so you can, like I said, have an idea of what’s going on with your body and know when to seek help and when to seek a physician to be evaluated. The first type of pain we want to talk about here is really the arthritic category and that kind of covers a lot and people say they have arthritis or stiffness in their joints and there’s different types of arthritis and one of the first things you have to do is determine whether it’s wear and tear or whether it’s actually a rheumatologic issue, which means your body is fighting itself and the cells in your body are breaking down the joints. Rheumatoid arthritis is one type and psoriatic arthritis is another, but when I say rheumatologic they kind of all fall into that category and it’s an auto-immune inflammatory issue. And then osteoarthritis would be an example of the wear and tear type. Dr. Rodgers, can you tell me when you look at a patient in evaluating arthritis of the hand and what do you recommend for people that are at home right now and say, “I’ve got some stiffness in my joints and when do I need to see a physician and when is it serious enough to see a physician?”
Dr. Alan Rodgers: Anytime your joints are bothering you to the point where you feel like it is affecting your daily life it’s always good to talk to your physician and you can start with your own primary physician or, if you want to, seek out a hand surgeon or an orthopedic surgeon immediately. We’re more than willing to see anybody who’s complaining of joint pain. The most important thing we look for is a history: what kind of pain, what joints are involved, when is it bothering you? Are you waking up in severe pain? Is it hurting you in the evening only? Does it get better or worse when you use it throughout the day? Things of that nature. Family history is very important, especially when you talk about rheumatoid arthritis. Did your mom or dad, your aunts, uncles, et cetera, did they have deformed joints and need hip replacements at young ages and things of that nature.
Dr. J. Michael Bennett: What are some of the newer treatments in regards to rheumatoid arthritis? I know some patients talk about these gold injections and some mention the new medications coming out. What are you seeing now in regards to rheumatoid arthritis and what are some of the treatments out there regarding that and when do you need surgery?
Dr. Alan Rodgers: I’m happy to say the main thing I’m seeing in the world of rheumatoid arthritis is less patients, and that’s because they’re handled medically far more effectively now than they were even back when I was training ten years ago. That doesn’t seem that long ago but we saw a lot more need for true joint replacements, tendon balancing, all these massive surgeries that have a significant recovery associated with them. Now we’re really not seeing that and all I can predict is that they are getting much better treatment through medications and a lot of the medications – and these are all taken care of through a rheumatologist; I don’t do the treatment of arthritis – are in the same family as the oncology medications and the anti-cancer medications and what it does is help to shut your body’s immune system down to preserve the joints. So we’re seeing far less operations for rheumatoid arthritis than we did many years ago.
Dr. J. Michael Bennett: Good for the patients, bad for you, right?
Dr. Alan Rodgers: (Laughter)
If you’re having issues of joint pain or stiffness and you’d like to meet with Dr. Bennett, please call our office at 281-633-8600.
Our office is part of the highly-regarded Fondren Orthopedic Group and we refer complex wrist and hand injuries to hand specialists at Fondren for treatment. The Fondren hand surgeons are board certified and have added qualifications in hand surgery.
Dr. J. Michael Bennett treats certain wrist and hand injuries including carpal tunnel syndrome, distal radius fractures (broken wrist), trigger finger and metacarpal fractures of the hand. He specializes in using the endoscopic approach to carpal tunnel syndrome, when appropriate for the patient, which means that the carpal tunnel surgery consists of two small incisions instead of a longer incision across the middle of the palm of the hand.
