High ANA Homogenous

Do you have any symptoms? That is a high titer but means nothing if you’re asymptomstic

Sounds very autoimmune.

This is exactly my presentation.

I had fatigue, digestive issues, joint pain and migraines with vertigo going back to 31yo in 2013. Was tested, ANA off the charts high like yours. My C4 was low and WBC low. Mildly positive RNP. But everything else normal.


Was told I had Undifferentiated Connective Tissue Disease and it was likely not causing my pain and I should see a psychologist. Wasted 2y seeing a psychologist while pain got worse. Fast forward to 2019 and I developed SEVERE autoimmune neuropathy such that I had to quit work.


I’ve since found good drs. It’s clear that I have a non-specific autoimmine disease in the same family as lupus and Sjogrens. I don’t have either disease, but bloodwork is similar and I have some of the same symptoms plus the neurological involvement.

I’m now on IVIG and starting Rituxin soon.

Find yourself a good dr who believes this is what’s causing your symtoms. Yours is non specific like mine, and most drs aren’t tough to recognize these things. Unless it fits the symptom pattern of a named disease, they’re lost. new symptoms can develop, or it could become one of these neatly defined diseases like RA, could just be in early stages . An autoimmune disease can attack any part of the body. I would characterize yours as Undifferentiated Connective Tissue Disease. I’m not saying it will get worse, but likely you need to stay on top of it.

Plaquenil is a good treatment to try. Unfortunately or fortunately dependending on how you look at it, yours probably isn’t bad enough to consider trying an immunosuppressive, and you likely won’t qualify for IVIG.

What part of the country are you in?

If you’re seeing blood in your stool you def should do that colonoscopy. Did the gastro say if he thought it was Crohns or Colitis? Could very well be one of these

It’s better to know and start getting treatment. Def go through w it. If it’s crohns whatever disease process is causing your your crohns could be causing the other symptoms. There are treatments

Keep me posted. I'd like to know the results of the colonoscopy, and what your rheumatologist says. I spend a lot of time in the FB groups, especially helping the autoimmune neuropathy people, but I will check back here from time to time. For whatever reason, the drs are just so incompetent with this stuff. I literally do not get it. Ask anyone w/ an autoimmune disease how long it took to get a diagnosis. Average is probably 7y. Every single one will say that they know more than their drs now, because they're forced to. It's wild. I spend my time pouring through immunology textbooks and papers on biologics. I'm forced to, although it's quite interesting.

Anyway, I havent tried Celebrex myself, but that's good that it helped, shows "proof of concept"...but there are much stronger things out there. Prednisone would probably work quite well, but you dont want to stay on that for long. I'm not as familiar w/ the cytokine inhibitors as they often dont work for neurological diseases like mine, but my guess is one of those would be what you need...assuming your symptoms are severe enough. Some people have these low-level autoimmune diseases that just smoulder under the surface and never really progress, and they can go without treatment. That's how mine was for a long time like i outlined above. Lets see what the rheumatologist recommends first.

Also, definitely stop the NSAIDs well before having a colonoscopy. As you know, they can cause bleeding and even inflammation in the colon or small bowel that resembles IBD and can complicate the colonoscopy findings.

Well, I used to go to Scripps. That, plus a little Googling, was all it took to figure out most of these doctors.

As for Dr. Coyle, he should be fine for IBD. I attend an annual IBD medical conference. He not only attends as well, but also he has given talks at the conference.

Aqualung, Beave and dcd2103,

I am also in my early 40s and also in San Diego with similar blood tests. In January tests came out High ANA (1:160), homogeneous, positive RNP (2.5), low CRP (<3), low WBC.

I also went to see a rheumatologist at Scripps who wasn’t overly concerned about anything. Said I was at the early stages of mixed connective tissue most likely, but that it’s too early to be put on drugs and that we should “keep an eye on things”. My biggest issues are fatigue and pain. I am also hypothyroid, have hormonal imbalances, some kind of gut issue and migraines.

Is there a good rheumatologist in San Diego for people in these early stages of connective tissue disease? I don’t know whether I should be put on drugs or not. The fatigue and pain has significantly affected my quality of life compared to just a few years ago. I’ve been lurking on these sites for a long time and saw San Diego and MCTD and thought it was maybe a sign I should reach out to others with more experience being treated for this condition.

My grandmother had MS and RA and my Aunt had something like lupus and my Dad has Neuropathy with Charcot foot so autoimmune runs strongly in my family.

Beave, I appreciate your reply and feedback. I hope this isn’t too much information. Yes, fatigue and the pain the worst problems for me.

Yes, hypothyroid is treated, they have me on a compounded T3/T4. The T3 is really low now because for the last 18 months I’ve been having symptomatic PVCs which are bigeminal in nature. My cardiologist said they can’t medicate me for the heart issues because my heart rate is too low, it goes down to like 35 and my blood pressure gets low too. It makes it hard to breathe when these episodes are happening, they are much worse at night. I went to the ER a few times, but I guess I’m getting used to it now and am scared of having arrhythmias if I get an ablation. I don’t think they wouldn’t let me take plaquenil.

They’ve been testing my ANA every couple years, due to the fatigue. about 5 years ago I started getting hives on my face from sunlight and a dermatologist tested my ANA but it was negative back then. I think they tested again in 2018 negative and then 2019, 2020 positive with the same titers and I went to see a Rheumatologist.

My pain is mainly in my feet and shoulder. The shoulder came on about 18 months ago, it was painful to breathe deeply, cough, etc and I couldn’t move it much without sharp pain. Eventually it turned into a dull constant thudding pain. I saw a specialist at scripps who said it was probably “a muscle issue” which didn’t make any sense to me. She had no advice other than physical therapy (didn’t do it).

For my feet pain I ran for about 20 years and now it hurts to walk a step and it’s also a dull constant pain even without walking. It’s worse in the metatarsal area. I ice them every day which helps a little, I took Advil a couple days because it was pretty bad and that helped much more. The foot pain came on suddenly about 6 months ago, I saw a podiatrist at scripps and he x-rayed my feet. He found an old fracture but nothing else. He didn’t see any signs of Charcot foot like my dad has thankfully. He told me to come back if the pain persists another 2 months, he just called it metarsalgia I think for generic pain in that area, so I’m close to having to go back now. I have special orthotics and walk inside with padded shoes. My feet are hot to the touch instead of ice cold which they usually are which makes me think it’s inflammation and so that’s why I ice them daily. I’m hoping if I go back they will inject steroids if appropriate.

For the gut issues, I had my gall bladder removed 20 years ago because they said it was diseased (no stones) and attributed much of my digestive issues to that being gone but I don’t know anymore. My gut issues are:

-not absorbing micronutrients, especially fat soluble like Vit D even though I take plenty of vitamins, no issues absorbing macronutrients
-lots of bloating and discomfort after eating in general
-no dairy, lactose intolerant. I try to stay away from gluten/grains as a precaution
-limited diet, eggs, broth and chicken seem to be the easiest thing to digest and some cooked veggies and a few low glycemic fruits.
-NSAIDS usually lead to stomach ulcer like pain so I avoid them, alcohol brings on this pain too as well as too much sugary food, citrus or spicy food, or enzymes to aid digestion
-h-pylori tested negative when having ulcer pain
-tested positive for SIBO in past
-have had throat ulcers, they gave me lidocaine syrup for those

With the gut issues of having to avoid NSAIDs and heart issues and likely not able to take plaquenil hopefully there would be good drug candidates without side effects.

I take really good care of myself like I think most lupus and mctd patients have to. I don’t think there is much more I can do other than try medication at this point.

Hi Beave,

Thank you for the insights.

They did an X ray on my shoulder and saw nothing. I wasn’t having the feet issues yet when I saw the rheumatologist, that came a couple months later. The rheumatologist told me to come back in a year as we keep an eye on it. It sounds like the chronic pain might be interrelated to an autoimmune issue, so I think I’ll go back to see the Rheumatologist sooner especially since the podiatrist saw nothing. Probably time to get more tests run to see if anything has changed as well.

I take glutathione injections but that was interrupted due to the pandemic onset, it’s a weird coincidence that this happened after I had to stop taking the shots. I kept hammering my doctor and now I am finally able to start those back up again. I have read that glutathione helps inflammation, I do feel better usually after having these. Hopefully it will make a difference soon.

I’ll keep looking at the lupus drugs that might be an option; some of the side effects are just frightening especially encephalitis, yikes.

It’s amazing how much more there is to learn about this disease by the medical community. It still seems like such a mystery since the symptoms are or can be so different for people.