Hi. My name is Kayti Brosnan. I'm a registered nurse here in Austin Texas. Today the question is "Can rheumatoid arthritis be considered a disability?” The answer is yes; absolutely it can be considered a disability. What's happening with rheumatoid arthritis is that it's an autoimmune disease which is actually attacking healthy tissue and muscle and joints. Eventually it's causing deterioration and disability. So, unlike when we have a minor injury that's going to heal over time. Any sort of injury that's caused by this auto immune response they are actually not healing to the full extent that we would heal in a normal situation. So, there's weakening of the tissue. There's weakening of the cartilage and then eventually there's scarring and there's limitations that are going on. Besides just that, besides if there's not deformities or deterioration it's an extremely painful and dilatation with that pain disease. It is documented that ten years after the onset rheumatoid arthritis patients are sixty; sixty percent of them are actually filed as disabled or on disability. So, the answer is yes.