Hello,
After two years of searching, I have found a rheumy that is wonderful. Found out I have OA in both knees; very painful. Now I have pain in my hands, feet and elbows. My doctor ran many lab tests, HLB27 came back positive. She says there is a lot of inflammation, but no diagnosis. After a week of pred, I felt better on the higher dose. Now I am on sulfasalazine. What can I expect with this medicine? She also wants me back on pred, but I am scared of this drug. I am very depressed and in pain and want answers. Thanks for listening.
HI,
I am pretty new to this myself. Vicodin helps with the pain. If you can stay off of prednisone, do it. We are all scared at one point or another. You are in good company. I hope you get the answers you need.
Laura T
Welcome to AI Rosebud. I'm kindof in the opposite situation here. I've had RA for years and I'm now being told I also have OA in my knees. That's worrisome for me as well.
It's good that you've found a doctor that you like. Predisone is often given in the beginning when it's suspected you have some sort of inflammatory illness. MOst often a dose of predisone will help you very quickly. It's not something you should take long term at all. Short term you might just find it to be a life saver!
Of course the goal would be to figure out what's going on and figure out a treatment. All too often that takes a while.
I was given predisone to get me though until my first DMARD sulfersalizine started working. I'd say I was on it about a month. MAYBE two. It's been so long ago I can't remember. It's one of the weaker DMARDS and usually a RD's first course of action. In my case it worked well. Over the years I've had to move to strong medications but for years it certainly slowed the progression in my case. I hope that will be the case for you as well.
Take the predisone for a little while as directed by your doctor. Let him know of your concerns about long term use and let him know you'd prefer to not do that. Once you get on a good medication that controls whatever is going on it won't be as nessesary.
Again; Welcome to AI.
Welcome to the board rosebud. We are all scared when we are first hit with ra or the possibility we have it. And there are times when even us old timers still get scared.
If you can stay off the pred you should try to. Unfortunately, when you have arthritis, your body doesn't produce enough corticosteroids that helps take care of inflammation so we have to give our bodies some oomph with prednisone. You should hope for inflammation relief with sulfasalzine. It should help take care of some of the swelling.
Please ask any questions you have. There are a ton of very nice and knowledgeable people here that will help you out.
It is scary but it will get better as the pain is brought under control and you see that you can make it through the tough times. I had no diagnosis for 2 years and was immensely frustrated by that, even thinking that maybe it was all in my head. It helped when I quit focusing on getting a diagnosis and instead on coping and on focusing on finding treatment and relief. I am still finding my way with this too and it's hard. Someone here told me I need to give myself time to adjust and find what works for me and that was good advice. Hope you feel better soon.
Laker
Dear Rose, Welcome!! This is scary stuff! If possible, get a beginning and and end to your prednisone. See if you can take it for 2 weeks, or 3 weeks and then start decreasing back down. I think all of us worry about this drug and for a good reason (read in wikipedia, if you can, it has all the scoop.....) I'm backing off of the pred right now, I've been taking 10mgs, now down to 9, 8 next week, 7 the following week until I can stop taking it. I only go down 1mg. per week. A long process.
But, ya know what, prednisone saved me from unbelievable pain, stiffness and swelling, so that's pretty much my story.
We love what it does to help us until the other meds take hold, but we need to get off of it! Welcome to our world of roller-coaster of medications. You'll get so much good info here, so keep asking questions, we all need to hear the answers.
sarah
Hi Rosebud,