I have had PMR 5 yrs. I enjoy good days now @ 4mg Pred daily plus 20mg Methotrexate per week.
2 wks ago my wife began having the same intense bone and surrounding tissue pain in all the customary PMR places; and worse in the morning until mid-day; lessening with some mobility. I can't stand to think she has PMR. Won't matter, she's got the pain. She has a schedule Dr. appointment June 11.24 and we'll soon have one person's medical opinion.
My question: does anyone know of conditions other than PMR that resemble it with pain and other symptoms. If so, what are the names of these conditions?
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DrRon
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Because NICE is an official UK entity and for some reason think their utterings are too important to be seen by anyone outside the UK. So it blocks any attempt to view it that doesn't have a UK IP address. The Guidelines and other things are for UK application only so theoretically are of no interest to anyone outside the UK. It comes down to money I suspect - you are welcome to view them by paying an access fee of £124 or thereabouts. Bit of a pain for a doctor on holiday thinking they'd study for exams though!
Sorry to hear that - PMR isn't the disease, it is the name for a set of symptoms which can also herald other disorders, especially some forms of inflammatory arthritis, as well as some nastier ones like a few cancers.
Here is a Medscape differential diagnosis list that you will be able to access:
Most of the nasties will be ruled out by standard blood tests - and PMR is a diagnosis of exclusion in the early stages. PET-CT or MRI can be fairly conclusive if they look for the right things but they are rarely employed by primary care.
The rest you will be familiar with although every person has a different version of PMR and once on pred your wife may have a far easier journey than you have,
Give her our best wishes and know she will be welcomed here,
I remember seeing a chart of PMR diagnoses a while back. All I can remember was that around 60% of PMR diagnoses were correct. There were other possibilities but the only ones I can remember were low vitamin D, fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis and cancer.
There are some other (often autoimmune) diseases that can mimic PMR symptoms. Many of them also come under rheumatology, so a good specialist can sort them out. A problem arises with the conditions that fall under neurology, because the muscle disfunction arises from auto-antibodies (contrast with immune-cell inflammation) attacking the nerves that control the muscles, rather than the muscles themselves. Myasthenia gravis is an example, as it can manifest as terrible fatigue with bilateral weakness in the back, neck, shoulders and/or limbs.
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