I saw my RD the other day and am stopping the methotrexate (makes me sick) and she thinks it is time for me to move up the ladder. I am still looking into antibiotic therapy, but am checking into all options. The options my RD gave me were: arava, remicade or enbrel. I have 2 weeks to decide (my next appt). I had a TB test, the pneumonia vaccine and the flu shot (all pre-requisites). How did you guys make the decision which med to take? Thanks for any info, thoughts, etc. love and hugs, J
Did your doctor give you any recommendations or pros & cons? I didn't so much decide what to take as my doctor recommended and I agreed.
And are you on a biologic right now too, or just a DMARD? I think it is pretty common to be on one of each, so I'm not sure why you would choose between them.
Sorry I'm not of much help. Also, I'm taking Imuran instead of mtx or Arava, so that might be another option.
My RD pretty much "suggested" that first I try plaquenil (made my hair fall out) then on to mtx (made me too sick) then on to Humira, which didn't work, now I'm on remicade and arava. He didn't really ask, as much as tell me this was what we were going to try next. But I trust him, for the most part.HI Julia,
I decided, when I was presented with options of humira, enbrel or remicade, on the last simply because it fit my lifestyle requirements and phobia needs the best. I travel a lot by plane and car (when and if I ever get back to work - on std) and am just not organized enough to have to carry around something that needs to be refrigerated especially. I am also terrified of sticking a needle into myself and just thought I would do much better with letting someone else stick me. And I have been really happy with my decision because the remicade is just a breeze to have administered. Unfortunately it doesn't look like it is working out for me...but I would recommend it to anyone and everyone that it might work for.
Good Luck to You!
Adele
Remicade worked great for me. Actually, Humira and Remicade worked well. I preferred Remicade because i don't like giving myself shots. Unfortunately, I became allergic.Enbrel is the one my RD recommended, mainly because it's been around the longest and he's had good results with many patients with it. It did take a long time (over 4 months) to be effective but now it's doing the job, along with MTX. The shots were creepy at first but I quickly got over that and learned to inject them easily.Hi Julia, the way I decided was well Mtx and me didn't mix. So that was out. Dr. suggested Enbrel or Humira. I don't know if it had any truth to this theory but I wsa thinking that if the humira infusion made me as sick as the mtx did, it might take longer to get out of my system - whereas the enbrel is injected weekly so i figured I'd be 'out of it' for a week at best if i had a reaction to it. My RD is all about starting low and slow and increasing if need be. We did the Enbrel thling for about 5 months and then i started having knee pains. He added Arava but only 1/2 the dose. He said we'd see how that went and if i tolerated it and had more pain, we could increase the arava. So far so good - I have aches and pains here as do all on the board but no reactions to the meds. Good luck.I chose Enbrel because it would be easier to stop it if I got a bad infection. Humira lasts twice as long, and I think Remicade lasts several weeks. Since Enbrel only lasts a week, I felt like I had more control over it. That is how I chose.