WHAT IS ESR, DD, DAC?

[jeanabelle]

I'm on here long enough to know but I don't. I see them all the time on here and wonder what they are. When I was with the jr doc last week she told me that at one time I had a reading of 98 at one time. I took it that that was when I be really in a bad way before going on diabolicals, as I call them, (biologicals).

Now I know these have been explained on here before but alot of you will know there is an underlying condition that comes with RA called "fuzzy brain syndrome" of which we have all suffered at one time or another. This means that I read something and read it again hoping that it will stay in my 'fuzzy brain' but no, nothing seems to stick for very long. I hasten to add that this is nothing to do with me being a blond of a certain age!!!! I've got that I keep a pen and a note pad beside me now so I can write things down.

I have a table that sits at 'my' end of the sofa. On that table sits the remotes, glasses, pen, notepad, Mobil, wrist splints, fan, magnifying glass, coffee mug and pain killers. All within reach so I don't have to move too far until my meds kick in in the morning. Does anyone have a table like that?

That's my epistle for the day. I have a pup here who has presented me with her first pee and poo free morning and I want to make a great fuss over her. If it wasn't pishing in the rain here in Ireland I would take them for a bit of a walk but it's not looking promising. Hope the rest of you have a great day or at lease as good as it can be for them. XX

[Hidden]

Ha ha - I relate to the puppy thing! Ruby is still a puppy to me but she's 8 months old now and Fred is still a puppy at 6! ESR is one inflammatory marker that is used by some surgeries and rheumatologists where others use the CRP more. Don't ask what these stand for - I do know vaguely but could never spell it and am in a rush - also got brain fog just like you! Its the sedementation rate - the rate at which some part of the blood settles and marks inflammation this way. You can look it up via google and the others too - which I don't know about. An ESR in 90s is pretty high although it can go higher and is non-specific to RA so inflammation caused by infection, surgery, viruses etc could cause a high reading too. Tilda x

[nellysgran]

Ha - yes you have just described my table .. I think we all have a table like that, just looking at it now....pen and paper, pain killers, mobile, glass of water, medication, tv remote and a packet of mints !!

Wendy xx

[jeanabelle]

Where would we be without our wee tables?????? X

[helixhelix]

I just love "diabolicals" ......why don't they give all the drugs more interesting names that maybe we could remember & pronounce?

ESR is erythrocyte sedimentation rate.....basically they pop your blood in a tube and time how long it takes for the big red blood cells to settle to the bottom. The faster it goes, the higher the number and the worse you are as means your blood is all clumping together like a nasty glass of murky beer.

DD...perhaps you mean degenerative disc disease? Shorthand for all of us with rubbish spines, where the cushioning pads between the vertebrae have crumbled so we just since hugely at every jarring step.

And DAS is disease activity score, which is a supposedly objective way for docs to work out how good/bad you are by doing a fancy calculation of number of tender/swollen joints, x the results of your ESR x how you say you feel on scale of 1 to 10. Not a great fan myself, but maybe helps treat people fairly.

And where's the bar of chocolate on your table?

polly

[jeanabelle]

AWH, polly don't tempt me. I put on a kilo every time I got a Tocilizamub infusion!! I am being taken off it now so I need to get back into my size 12's again for the summer.

Do you know the big bar of Cadbury's? Well I ate a full one myself yesterday!!!!! I hate myself and its really easy to blame the drugs, isn't it?

Thanks for the. Reply