I presume that the person is getting treatment for rheumatoid arthritis. Generally the person who is getting treatment for rheumatoid arthritis is a long term continuous treatment. We do attempt to stop the medications in some individuals who have achieved a remission status. That is they have achieved a very good disease control. There are no more joint which are painful, no joints which are swollen and their inflammatory markers, that is ESR and CRP, they have been normal or atleast 2 years, in them we gradually reduce the medications and try to stop them. However we have been able to achieve this remission in only 25% of the individuals after stopping the medicine. So 75% of them the disease tends to come back. Usually it comes back after 6 months to 12 months after stopping the medication. So in these cases, wait and watch and see. If the pains are coming back, you need to go to your doctors that the medications can be restarted.
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