Hi. I was flicking channels last night and clicked onto "doctors behind closed doors".
A mentally sharp 91 year old lady was describing pains in her arms which prevented her moving them above a certain point. The nurse or doctor said there is something called Polymyalgia we can do some tests to see if you need medication for it.
I settled down excitedly to wait for the outcomes at the end of the prog. And they went through the different people and then said the lady had been prescribed steroids to help with her chronic pain. I felt a sense of being underwhelmed that the condition was not mentioned clearly at the end of the programme! Did any one else see it.?
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Animalover65
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It was rather underwhelming.... but then a program like that doesn't really have the scope or time to give something like PMR the coverage it probably deserves. Everything is quite 'fleeting'.
Wouldn't it be lovely to have a whole program that was dedicated to documenting up to date & realistic information & explanations of everything PMR/GCA related though. Imagine that!!
That is what I was thinking, topics can only be touched on briefly.
I was just laughing to myself as was getting excited at the thought of what would be mentioned at the end of the programme and it was blink and you would miss it! But at least it was mentioned.
It would have to be serialised to cover everything 😁. Many of us would be in remission by the final episode. Wouldn’t it be something if PMR/GCA were fleeting.
I mustn’t be too cynical; perhaps this mention is the start of something useful?
I hope everyone enjoyed the early morning sunshine.
Och - it gets a mention every so often - both PMR and GCA have starred in Doc Martin but in a very ineffective and dismissive way since he did the biopsy on the kitchen table and a dose or two of pred had Aunty back to normal ...
Yes!!... I remember that episode. It was dismissed so lightly wasn't it.... it was all dealt with in the same way he'd have advised some paracetamol for a high temperature...... "Here! Take these. Problem solved"!!They'd be better not incorporating conditions like PMR/GCA in these medical dramas if they can't portray them authentically and realistically. Just perpetuates the 'myths' around them.
The point is, it’s not it’s not billed as a serious medical programme -it’s billed as an entertainment series with a few medical issues thrown in because the main character happens to be a doctor. I’m sure many watch it for the scenery and lighthearted banter between the major prayers, not to be medically informed. For that, they’d go to a factual medical programme - plenty of them around.
Yes very true. My late husband was a GP - I think it would have made him laugh at how lightweight it was! The scenery and the lighthearted banter is quite compelling though - 🤣
My mother was a consultant in Holloway Prison. For those who remember, she was obsessed with Within These Walls with Googie Withers who was the prison governor, and always said there must be someone in there telling them plot lines as she could relate to a lot of them.
Yes, I remember that and thought, this is all very inaccurate with lucky Aunty Ruth right as rain after her steroid dose and then never referred to again.
Not sure about Doc Martin, as it’s was produced by ITV , but many BBC programmes do have a telephone no to call if people want extra info about what been in the programme.
I remember snorting - but I did give the doctor brownie points for mentioning it!!
I can't remember - which practice was it? When it was centred on the Bradford practice they tended to have the same patients with chronic conditions appear regularly so you saw how that plays out in a GP practice. The Birmingham practice does it a bit too.
Menopause only talked about so much these days because celebs and high profile people have now experienced it. In another 10 years or before, PMR/GCA will be talked about and brought to the forefront much more than our generation has, as the now 40s + generation experience it themselves. I also think they will not be fobbed off with long term harmful steroids, when there are newer, safer drugs.
No,I never see it,but I hate the way they keep repeating the stories and have to wait till the end to see outcomes..Not enough publicity on Gca PMR that's for sure.
I was watching with my daughter and when lady started describing her symptoms I immediately said PMR! It would have been good if Dr had explained it a bit more fully but they only have an hour for whole programme so no chance.It would be great if there was a medical programme about PMR to make people more aware.
I suppose it will depend how long they were filming and whether the lady had been discharged to home to start her steroid treatment. I doubt they would have followed up on progress. It would have been interesting to find out how she was doing.
I found that, and an older one about Kate Gilbert …but it doesn’t bring up recent copies…guess that’s because there is a subscription for currents ones….
Worth try if you don’t mind -but not sure if HU will allow -they are a bit funny about what you can attach. Photos are okay -but not sure about scanned files -probably depends what your computer saves it as…
My friend sent the article to me - it was quite informative and makes people of a certain age aware of the condition. Although I don’t think anyone understands it until they have it.
When you Google PMR it comes over as such a lightweight condition. I love it when Dorset Lady describes it as "a serious debilitating illness" but I think that the general profile it has is much less dire. Of course there are those who have only had it for 18 months and they get rid of it (lucky them) and then there's the rest of us who are still struggling after many years. it's such an individual illness.
Yes! A blue badge would be so helpful (sometimes I don’t set out, for fear of not having the stamina to get back!) Yet as I understand it, most of us wouldn’t qualify under current rules…..😟
What bothers me is that there doesn’t seem to be a serious study in the past ten years about PMR. No investigations as to possible causes, prevention, cures, etc. PMR gets lumped in with Fibromyalgia quite often because of the similarities in the name. But they are definitely not even remotely related (in my opinion).
Thanks for the links. I read both, beginning to end. Neither showed any investigations as to the possible causes or prevention of PMR, which was my original comment. Both had treatment suggestions, all of which has been known and practiced in the past fifteen years.
The second article has a map showing the incidence of PMR by country. North America and Europe show huge difference than the rest of the world. Mexico has an almost zero incidence of PMR cases.
As you probably know from following my comments, I have always suggested that the cause of PMR might be from our overprescribed and extensive use of statins.
“In 2020, statin utilisation was highest in North America and Europe (279.7 and 159.9 DDDs/TPD, respectively) and substantially lower in Latin America, MENA, East Asia, South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa (66.1, 64.1, 29.3, 16.1 and 24.7 DDD/TPD, respectively).”
If you completely read this article, you will realize it is a study in how to increase the availability and use of statins in third world countries. Another promotion by the Pharmaceutical industry to increase sales.
The same applies to causes of PMR as to any other autoimmune disorder - and the research there applies as much to PMR as to RA, lupus or anything else. I suspect you don't really gey what would be involved in such an undertaking and the cost of such work. That is basic research - and the money isn't available for a relatively easy to manage disorder that is perceived as usually self-limiting that only affects the older generation. It isn't cute and cuddly like babies and doesn/t have massive economic effects. When you win the euromillions or the US equivalent you could fund it ...
PMRpro has replied in similar to what I would have said... but no, "they" don't know what causes PMR - apart from being of Scandinavian descent {Vikings got to parts of UK -and via their descendants to N. America and Australasia- and Eastern Mediterranean - but not Asia, Africa, South America], environment and genetics.
PMR has been around for over a hundred years [one of the first cases in 1888 by Bruce, another in 1890 by Hutchinson] [albeit maybe not recognised as such nor recorded correctly in significant numbers - ] - long before statins..
Plenty of serious studies about PMR but they don't have a lot to do with public perception either. A lot of relevant research is not directly PMR but immunology in general. But in case you hadn't noticed, the last 3 years have been preoccupied with Covid - which also interfered with recruitment for PMR studies that were ongoing. A study takes 5 years and usually more from beginning to end - and a lot of that is getting the funding. They don't come cheap.
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