sick and tired of feeling sick and tired...

Started Cimzia and passed out after 2nd doses. Ever since then I have had rapid heart rate and intermittent chest pain with low grade fever. Not sure if its a reaction or not. My GI facility is very frusterating because they said to go to Urgent Care to get checked out. I had already went to my primary dr because I hadn't heard from the GI office. Primary Dr ordered an  EKG which will be done tommorrow morning and then she told me that she thinks its a sensitivity to the Cimzia but she doesnt know too much about the medication so I need to get instructions from my GI. So my GI office calls me back and after I told them I was seen already then they said okay and told me to call if I had any other questions. I stopped the nurse before she hung up and told her I need to know about if my GI thinks its a reaction because I am due on 02/02/13 for more loading shots. So I still have no answers ...yet I am having chest pains, rapid heart rate periodically not to mention going to the bathroom 10-20 times per day, stomach cramps, and blood/mucous in all BM's.

Love my GI dr...hate the office

Has anyone else had this kind of experience?? Also can you talk to your GI directly over the phone or can you only talk to the office staff?? Would be really nice to just have a quick conversation with the GI instead of telling 3 or 4 people what the problem is. Ridiculous..

i had this happen from humira shots. well, i almost fainted from the pain and hyperventilating. i went numb and got very cold. my doctor told me to not take the next shots because this reaction is severe and i could go into shock next time. my heart rate has been very high since my starting doses, too. resting heart rate is 120 bpm all the time now.

My doctors office staff can be irritating when your sick. You have to leave a message for the nurse then she has to call you back. Then she has to leave a message for the doctor then she has to get the message from the doctor. Then she calls you back. This has been complicated further lately by the fact that I have returned to work. So I call the nurse and she calls my husband back who gives her my message and then starts the process. I have literally stayed home from work just to deal with this process. I miss way to much work anyway because I am in a flare. The whole process is hard to deal with when your ill. Plus the nurse will be like the doctor is not going to do that and the doctor will do it. Then sometimes she won't ask him if he will do it and it'll have to wait til I have an appt and I ask him.

lovemyboys...did you start the mtx at the same time?Could that in part be a contributor?

Personally, I wouldn't take another drop of the cimzia...and I'd call the doctor's office and set up an appointment asap. You need to talk with your doctor face to face.

Hope you feel better soon.
q

If I need to talk to my GI I simply call the office and tell them I would appreciate of he could contact me at his earliest convenience. He has called me back both times when he was free to talk to me.

Steve

Christine...I am very similar to you. I also had UP for the last 5 years but now has moved up into the sigmoid colon also with ileum involvement also. Imuran gave me serum sickness reaction...Remicade didn't work...Humira worked for about 1 1/2 years and now Im on Cimzia. I was on prednisone for 8 months straight and then off and on. I don't think Im at the place yet where I want to do surgery but I am also miserable. I have 3 kids (9, 4, 2) and up til this point was okay coping with this but lately have had a harder time making to all there events...(haven't missed one though).

Im going to ask him if there is a way I can have him call me if Im having issues. I got introuble last appointment because I stopped a medication without asking because I developed mouth sores and thats what he did the last time it happened. If it was easier to get a hold of him then I wouldn't have a problem doing so.

I definately feel like im in a bad situation...They are supposed to call me back today they said so we shall see. My plan is...if I don't get a call back from them discussing what to do about taking the med again then I will skip the dose on 2/2 and will wait until my appointment on 2/14 to discuss in person with him. At that time I will let him know that if we can't figure out a proper way to communicate beside set appt times then I will have to find a new dr that is willing to take 5 minutes out of the day and give me a straight forward answer. I am bummed out about this though because me and my GI have a fantastic pt/dr relationship and its very important to feel comfortable with a dr dealing with these types of issues.

No call today....

I am feeling alright now. Heart still racing off and on. Feeling just "off" if that makes any sense. I medicated myself with benadryl and I am on methylprednisone so I am wondering if that helped the reaction at all...who knows.

UC wise...I feel like krapt. I can't eat anything without having to go. Everything gives me stomach pain/cramps. My primary dr gave me Bentyl to try to take before I eat and I see a tiny bit of difference with that. GI dr gave me cholestramine (sp?) powder at my last appointment but makes me have nausea and sometimes vomit. My MTX injection that I took didn't make me faint so I have a hard time believing it was from giving myself a shot. I have lost 10 lbs since my appt on 1/3.

I have just weaned down to 8 mg of Methylprednisone. I started at 32 mg and then am weaning down. Hasn't seemed to help to much to be honest this time. It is for UC because I started flaring really bad since December. Thats when we realized (through colonoscopy) the UC moved up into the colon more and was moderate inflammation. Biopsys came back the whole colon was active disease but only part of it has inflammation.

I'm assuming no call today either?

q

one plus...you have today and another week to harass to get the call-back.

q

Yay! there's hope. Well, they HAVE to blame it on you initially. Best they check it out, however.

Can you screw up the injection in any way? I'm totally clueless about that part.

Very curious as to the outcome.
q

Im feeling a little better as far as the heart racing....as far as my other symptoms...maybe a little. Im not on asacol that was under what I am not taking anymore because it didn't work. My insurance wont cover Colazal so we never tried it.

Quincy...its pretty hard to mess up a sub q injection. It just goes right under the skin....not hard and doesn't take long to inject usually. This medication is a lot thicker than MTX and Humira though.