New to group with questions

January 9, 2008

Hello,

I just joined this group as my husband was recently diagnosed with PA

after a quick severe onset of hand, hip and foot pain after an entire family

bout with Strept. He gets it worse in the am and pm and he is 44.

So far my two young daughters show no sign of the P that my husband has had

for many years. I of course, did not know anything about PA until last month.

He thinks it may be the antibiotics that triggered it but most everything i

have read says an infection could trigger it.

So he saw his primary who did blood tests to rule out rheumatoid A and has

ordered hand x rays and is also being treated by a homeopathic physician who

has him on a vitamin B, fish oil, selenium regimen and fish oil (and Emu

oil?) I am a bit skeptical of the Emu oil but we are open to all ideas.

So far he is just using ibuprofen once or twice a day as needed and he is

someone who is very opposed to medication but we want to stall any progression

as he is a musician and his fingers are critical to his work. To top it off he

is self employed and we have catastrophic health insurance that basically

covers nothing until we meet the huge deductable.

We always thought his fingernail issues were fungus and that he had bad

dandruff.

The primary did not even mention a rheumotologist but after the X rays I

wanted to set an appointment. I was glad to find this group. So here are my

questions.

1. Does anyone have a recommendation for a Rheumotologist in the the dc

metro area. We were thinking of looking into Hopkins in Baltimore?

2. What alternative therapies have worked for you?

3. Is there a way to get a sense of the long term prognosis based on current

symptoms? We are talking about how to equip the house with a wheelchair at

the same time we wonder if have another 10 years of just painkillers until it

gets worse??? From what I read it could go either way and the course is

somewhat unpredictable.

The news could not come at a worse time in our lives for many reasons but I

guess there is never a " good " time. Your stories are inspiring and I hope

after this initial shock we will get into the groove of dealing day to day.

Thank you so much- Theodora

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