Advice for Better Living Archives

My Dr. wants to put me on Remicade. I am allergic to Embrel and the other drugs have not worked for me! I am currently on Methotrexate, Prednisone and Arava! I can survive on these drugs, but not to the point of being able to work! I have small veins, with a tendency to blow out and my question is has anyone else with similar problems been on Remicade? If so, did they have problems with the infusion?

Remicade--make sure your blood pressure is monitored during the infusion. my first infusion went ok; 10 minutes into the second infusion my BP went to 220 and all sort of pains-was rushed to cardiac care--damaged my heart a bit--have extra beats. later found out after calls to the manufacturer and nat'l institute of health, that remicade can lower or raise your BP, my reaction,per the nih was caused by too fast an infusion rate. went back to rheumatologist and questioned him, found out hthe first infusion raised my BP to 180 asked him why he increased the second infusion rate, especially since my BP went to 180 on the first infusion--got a wimpy answer--"...it's standard practice.."

most people do ok with remicade, i seem to have problems with most of the dmards

just watch the BP

good luck
vince m

Hi there, I have had 7 infusions of Remicade and they nurses seems to be very good with getting a vein. They do it every day all day long...they know what they are doing. I go to a hosptial for mine. Im afaid Im not getting the results I had hoped for tho. I seem to be the only one nore really responding the way they would like me to. They are thinking about Embrel for me. I had NO alergy problems from the Remicade..Write me if you want to..Pat at yesteryear@eatel.net