Question about fibro.

I have a post in Chronic Pain because the pain is expansive and I don't have a diagnosis yet but that's the only thing the last doctor had to say before throwing up his hands and saying I don't know. I've been doing some reading here and there on fibromyalgia and something I seem to come across a lot of is inflammation. I was wondering if an SED (sedimentation rate (ESR)) blood test would show the inflammation? Mine had come back more than normal at a 4.

Thank you for your time.

I was diagnosed 4 years ago although I think I have had fibromyalgia longer. My inflammation numbers are showing normal as well. My mother and sister have very high inflammation markers.

The last I heard is that fibro is not an inflammatory illness. As you see, members have responded that they didn't show inflammation.

My ESR and CRP tests were high. I do have a lot of inflammation but it's not from fibro. I have ankylosing spondylitis, osteoarthritis, Crohn's disease, diabetes, and auto-immune inner ear disease and these are causing the inflammation. So you might have fibro and something else if you are showing high levels of inflammation.

It sounds like you have been through the myriad of test to rule out other illnesses that have many of the same symptoms as fibro...illnesses like lupus, Lyme disease, and MS. These are ruled out before they give a diagnosis of fibro. There is no good test for fibro so it's a process of elimination for us because our tests come out normal. How fast you are diagnosed is how fast your doctor achieves this. Some are diagnosed in months and others have spent a year, two, or more to get a diagnosis.

The primary criteria for fibro diagnosis is pain in four quandrants of the body, fatigue, and cognitive memory problems. Plus the other illness have been ruled out. I hope this helps you.

Be sure to read Fibro 101...the first thread on the forum. There are links to good info about fibro and you will learn a lot there. Good starting links are Symptoms, What Else Could It Be, and A Thorough Explanation of Fibromyalgia. These will give you a pretty good idea if you have fibro or not.

I'm looking forward to getting to know you better. Please let us know what you find out because we do care about you. Hope to hear more from you soon.

Sherrine

Fibro does have periods of horrible pain. You did not say what symptoms you do not feel belong to fibro. My inflammation tests were normal but any time i try to go off of an anti inflammatory i get in real trouble.

Hope you get some answers and some help.

It's not uncommon to have Fibro hit hard and quick. They say the average time to get a proper diagnosis is something like 5 years, but you can speed it up by pushing (which I did). I was diagnosed within about 6 months (and got much worse during the next 6 months). Part of why I was diagnosed so fast was because a) my neuro did pretty much every test on the planet to try to figure out what was going on with me b) I have a friend who runs our local Fibro group that suggested I look into Fibro as a cause for my symptoms (once the Neuro came up empty), so c) I asked the Neuro for a referral to a Rheumatologist (and got it rather quick). Once I saw the Rheum he was like "why are you here, the Neuro already did every test I'd do?" So, I told him I wondered if I had Fibro, he did the tender point check and there we had it.

The symptoms of Fibro are actually pretty broad and overlap so many other things. The key is to rule out all those other things. All of those symptoms you listed actually are pretty common with Fibro. The numbness/tingling in my hands/arms was one of my first symptoms that started me at the Neuro. Nausea and dizziness can be part of it as well, but another thing you may want to look into is Dysautonomia (it's about as unknown now as Fibro was 20 years ago, so finding a dr that knows about it may be difficult). The symptoms are very much like Fibro but the dizziness and nausea are more common as are the issues with temperature.

Well, l wish you better luck with the rheumatologist! Finding a doctor you can work with is a huge part of getting relief. Let us know how it goes!

Debbie

A good doctor it seems these days are worth their weight in gold. I've had some bad ones in the past and some great ones. Sometimes I wish I could move back to Reno just so I could have my doctor back. He was very reasonable and if he suspected anything he had no problems running tests, more tests.

Oh man, see this is why I am very happy that I came here. There's a lot of this stuff that I hadn't been sure about being a part of the same thing. Not that I'm happy about the idea of it being fibro, but I am happy that there's a good possibility it isn't something more serious.

Its funny how when reviewing things you realize how much really shouldn't be normal, but I am sorry that you've been dealing with this since childhood.