How do you manage your joint pain?

I'm experiencing a huge increase in joint pain lately. Its in every major joint from my neck to my knees. It is annoying but bearable during the day, but it leads to difficulties when I want to sleep. I just can't hold still or get comfortable. Sleeping pills don't really solve the problem either.

My doctor increased my dose of Imuran but that should take a few weeks to kick in at the soonest. I have not found Tylenol to be effective with this sort of pain, and Ultram only sort-of helpful. Is there something you have used that has helped your joint pain, in the daytime or at night?

If stats matter, I'm 26, diagnosed with CD for about 8 years, had a partial illectomy a year or so ago. I take 200mg of Imuran daily. My GI doc is reluctant to prescribe anything for pain, but my family doctor is a little bit more flexible and would probably prescribe something to get me through the time until my new dose of Imuran kicks in.

Since we can't use NSAIDS such as Celebrex, Motrin or Aleve, I use Percoset as my pain reliever. My GI doesnt prescribe pain meds either, I get them from my family doctor. Do go see your family doc and ask for something stronger to help your pain. Hugs!

I get percocet from my family doctor. My GI is aware that I take it for my joint pain and has never said anything negative about it. I only take it when its extremely bad.

Joint pain is what I suffer with alot unfortunately.

G.I.'s and the medical world only really started recognizing Crohn's arthritis within the past couple years. I remember reading the story I believe last year or the prior year that medical journals were finally listing it as a symptom of the the disease and other IBD diseases. Of course, we patients have known about this forever and have been self treating it through our primary care physicians or rheumys. Most G.I.s are still learning how to treat it and will most of the time refer you to a rheumy.
Arthritis is one of my worst complaints and I am only 31 years old. I have tried just about everything to combat it but the 4 things that really help me are Remicade, hydrocodone 10, diet, and exercise. The first 2 are pretty obvious as to why they would help but the second 2 are just as important. When I eat right, my whole body feels better and my joints get the necessary lubricants to help with countering the arthritis.(this is not always easy to do and is a huge struggle for me) It is hard to want to exercise when your joints hurt and you feel like crap but it does help when you get your joints moving. Most days I am not able to do major exercise but even good stretching(or yoga I have heard) helps with breaking up that arthritis stiffness. I also try and use a heat to help on really stiff days.
A few years ago I was referred to a Rheumy whom promptly put my on methotrexate and 6 mp along with my monthly remicade infusions. My arthritis was almost cured but unfortunately my liver did not get the message of the good news and decided to revolt. I had to stop the med combination. I did not appreciate what remicade did for me until I went off of it and tried humira and cimzia. I walked around like an old man and could tell the weather better than a meteorologist. I am so glad that I am back on it because now I can sense what it was doing for me and appreciate it.

yea, man my lower back and mid back just kill me when itry to do something that requires a little effort, and i have never had back pain until rem. so I know it's the culprit. i insisted my gi prescribe all med's related to my cd. I want him to know about pain, other stuff that i might need for other things I have gp do those. I take 1-2 vic's aday. I got tired of gi's not giving pain med's, that's ridiculous. my gi evan said, I needed them to get proper rest.

Hi Sunny55 and welcome to Healingwell. Does the MSM just help the arthritis type pain or would it work for fibro like symptoms too? Hugs!

Nah that stuff has aspirin in it and aspirin/caffiene aren't friends of mine. My pain meds help ease the pain and help me to sleep. I may try the MSM though for my knees that both need replacements in them. That might help when the cortisone shots fail before its time for my next one. Hugs!

I agree with Gail. NSAIDs can be very hard for IBDers, and cause bleeding, which you really don't want. Have you consulted a rheumatologist? I've heard from my husband's rheumatologist that methotrexate is really good at controlling joint inflammation. It's like the gold standard drug for RA.

Methotrexate is also sometimes effective in managing gut symptoms. Perhaps you can talk to your doctor to see if MTX maybe a better drug option for you than Imuran, if upping the dose of imuran doesn't work.

In terms of pain mgmt, perhaps if you have a particular joint that is really painful, a cortisone shot into the joint will help? Or a course of low dose prednisone to manage the inflammation so that the pain goes down. You can see if you can wean yourself from the pred as the imuran kicks in? It really sounds to me like in order to get reasonable relief from the pain, you have to address the inflammation.

This is what I would recommend to my hubby if he were in this situation - to get on a short course of low dose prednisone to manage the inflammation and live without pain until imuran can kick in, or you can switch to a different med. Also, remicade/Cimzia/Humira can also help with joint pain as well.

I hope you get some relief soon.

PV

I have been takinbg Tramadol for 7 years on an as-needed-basis. For pain not controlled by that, I have Vicodin. Recently, it was found that massive muscle spasms in my back were causing the bursa surrounding the muscles to become severely inflamed. So my rheumy gave me valium to combat the spasms to keep the bursa inflammation at bay. I take it only as needed for the spasms. Those occur if I sit for longer than 1o minutes at a time.

BTW, this was the first I realized that bursa aslo cover muscles.