Swollen lymph nodes in front of ears

[Jaycee57]

I have had PMR for nearly 5 years. Whenever I taper down to 1 mg of Prednisone, I have a flare up. This time I have had jaw and knee pain. This disappeared after going up to 10mg of pred. However, I have now dropped to 4 mg but have swollen lymph nodes in front of ears and my ears feel blocked. I am being treated with anti biotics. Is this all connected to my flare up? I would be most appreciative of any advice. I don't know what I would have got by without this site.

[Chihuahua1]

I am no expert by any stretch of the imagination, but if you are having jaw pain I would ask the Dr to test for GCA the next time the jaw pain shows up.

[Jaycee57 in reply to Chihuahua1]

Thank you . I have had blood test and all ok but I know from past experience the markers don't always show up.

[Chihuahua1 in reply to Jaycee57]

There are other tests that are done for GCA. I'm not certain what others there are but I do know that one of them can be a biopsy to see if any giant cells are visible. Perhaps one of the admin may know more about it. From what I understand, PMR and GCA can quite often go hand in hand.

[PMRpro Ambassador in reply to Chihuahua1]

Even the biopsy is not foolproof. If they find giant cells in the biopsy tissue then that is 100% certain that it is GCA. However, if they don't find the cells it doesn't mean you don't have GCA, it means they didn't find the evidence which isn't the same thing There are several reason for that from the GCA not affecting the bit of artery they looked at to poor technique on the part of the surgeon or lab staff. You may not have symptoms of GCA in the arteries in the head - but still have LVV, large vessel vasculitis in the arteries in the trunk, closer to the heart. And it isn't possible to take biopsies of them except during major surgery.

[Jaycee57 in reply to PMRpro]

Thank you , I will definitely follow this up. I was told that I had only 5% of GCA symptoms as I don't have crushing headaches or 'snaking headaches' whatever that is! Maybe, I should up my steroids as it could be due to a Pmr flare up.

[PMRpro Ambassador in reply to Jaycee57]

You cannot measure percentages of GCA symptoms! Roughly speaking, each GCA symptom listed appears in 40% or less of patients. There is a form of GCA labelled "occult GCA" where there are no symptoms of any sort until the patient wakes one day with visual symtoms, even loss of sight.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/955...

[Jaycee57 in reply to PMRpro]

Thank you for your help.

[Jaycee57 in reply to PMRpro]

Would I have some protection from possible sight loss if I am on 4mg of steroid?

[PMRpro Ambassador in reply to Jaycee57]

Very unlikely indeed. There are doctors who say if you are on pred you are safe - if that were true they wouldn't use such high doses of pred in GCA. It must be enough to manage the level of activity of the autoimmune disorder - if it is high, you will need a lot more pred.

[Jaycee57 in reply to PMRpro]

Ok, better contact my Doctor , thanks again.

[Chihuahua1 in reply to PMRpro]

Thank you for sharing your knowledge about this. My knowledge is minimal at best, although a little more than it was now.🙂