Health encyclopaedia - Alphabetical Topic List
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Symptoms of Ankylosing spondylitis
AS usually starts with lower back pain and muscle spasm, which happen more and more often and are usually worse at night. This pain can spread to the upper back and neck or buttocks and hips. The condition mostly affects young men or teenagers under the age of 30.
Symptoms may also include severe stiffness of the back, particularly early in the morning. This generally eases during the day with exercise, but can lead to a permanent, fixed curvature of the spine if the condition is not treated.
As the disease progresses, fever, fatigue, loss of appetite and loss of weight become more common. The spine becomes less able to move freely, and smaller breaths are taken. Eventually, the chest may not be able to expand at all, forcing the person to breathe using the diaphragm and the muscles of the wall of the abdomen. In extreme cases the spine may become extremely stiff and sometimes no spinal movement at all is possible.
AS can affect any joints and it is common to experience aching, pain and swelling in the hips, knees and ankles. It may also have a mild affect on the heart and lungs.
Around one in three people develop a severe inflammation inside one or both eyes, with blurred vision, dull eye-ache and redness, especially around the edge of the cornea (the outer covering of the front of the eye).
