How does the doctor determine whether you have mild, moderate or severe RA?
is it to do wit xrays maybe
I think it is difficult to determine the severity at the onset of the disease. I had very high levels of inflammatory markers at the beginning so they treated it aggressively. I was lucky and responded well and now I would say I have mild symptoms. They took base line x-rays at diagnosis and repeated them 2 years later to compare the appearance of the joints. I guess that if there has been a lot of joint damage it is regarded as severe. Also if they have difficulty settling the inflammation and finding the right drug to control the disease they might regard it as severe. .hope this helps.
One of the ways they check this, is to measure the amount of antibodies AGAINST YOU that are in your blood. Just as your immune system makes antibodies to fight measles or flu, with autoimmune disease it makes antibodies to fight you. The more servere your case is, the more anti-you antibodies there are.
It s worked out with something called DAS28. Look up about this on NRAS website for full explanation of how it is worked out. A score of 5.2 or more is active disease, less than 3.6 is low disease activity. You should have a DAS28 score on at least some of your reports from consultant. Hope this helps.
would that be National RA website?
ok, nevermind Rowbirdie, I am looking it up Thanks
Stands for national rheumatoid arthritis society- NRAS. Hope you find it 
Despite having very high anti-CCP antibodies at diagnosis My symptoms are mild now. Don't despair if yours comes back as severe because it is not set in stone. It can and does vary.