treatments for RA

emmarose33

Hi,
I was just looking for people's opinions on certain drugs, if they've tried them, did they help?
Firstly methotrexate? If I can wean my little boy off the breast then I I'll start this. In injection form. I am not keen as I won't be allowed to drink (agggh!) but my consultant is desperate for me to start this.
Secondly - gold? Consultant says if I really don't want to go on MTX we could try gold injections first. Anyone had this?
Thirdly - has anyone tried accupuncture? Obviously this will be in addition to modern medicine, but I have heard it can be very helpful. Any success stories?
Cheers everyone.

alibongo

Hi

I have been taking methotrexate for 18 months and it has been a success for me. I am so much more able to do things now (I couldn't up off the sofa without help before) I still work full time I just have to pace myself and not over do things.

I haven't had any nasty side effects (touch wood) and now am up to 25 mg per week. Ive recently been started on plaquenil too. I just make sure I go for my blood tests every month and get them recorded. Luckily my GP has a daughter who is on the drug too so he is very clued up.

I don't know about the gold injections but I am sure someone on here will.

Alison

colinone

Hi Emma
First 0of all welcome to the site its nice to meet you, my name is colin and i did read your other post. Not sure if i'm an insperation or a depressant. I dont know much about breast feeding and such things so ill steer clear of that. By the way i have RA and PA I tried the gold injections prior to MTX and it did not work, MTX worked great for abuot 2 years although i did have side effects. I'm now on anti TNF drugs you can look them up on the net.
All people are not the same and cope differently with the side effects of medication, some like Alibongo get none. I know the whole thing is scary and i feel so sorry for you being so young and a mum as well. My heart goes out to young mums who have to cope with so much on top of the illness it must be so hard at times.
You said you had some steroid injections was it the depot medrone into the bum or the one in your joints. The one in the bum normaly gives you relief for a month or two. When it comes to medication its normally the pain that dictates what rout you take but what works some doesent work for others, all i can say is try it and see if it works. If you do get side effects that you cant cope with the Rheumy will take you off it and try to find a drug that suits you. On another point there are other young mums on the site and i'm sure in time you will talk to them. Every body has different ways of coping with thier illness and you will find your own way to cope. Take Care Emma and keep your chin up.
Colin

jackie1955

alibongo wrote:

Luckily my GP has a daughter who is on the drug too so he is very clued up. Alison

That comment is very reassuring and says a lot for MTX doesn't it

Jackie x

suzster

hi, i have a 2 yr old daughter i have RA that first started jusy after i had my daughter, although symptoms were sneaking up before she was born.
i didn't b feed her so when they eventually diagnosed me which took 7 months i was started on sulphasalazine, this helped a little but not a great deal, then i was started on methotrexate as well as the sulpha.
i slowly got up to 25mg in tabket form whicjh helped alot for a fe months but side effects were hard to cope with, especially when looking after a baby and a 10 yr old. the side effects were sickness. i took my tablets on a saturday night so that when the sickness started my husband was able to help look after our children.
but slowly the sickness got worse and the methotrexate got less affective so next the rheumy asked me to try methotrexate injections.
they were great, no sickness and a great deal of relief from my symptoms. i felt great for about 6 months, hardly any flare ups, great!
but then the sickness started to rear it's head again, but it was worse, i'd feel sick for 48 hrs sometimes longer and i ended up speaking to my rheumy nurse and we decided to stop the methotrexate for a few weeks to make sure it was that that was causing the sickness, which it was and to give my body a rest.
now i've gone back to a slightly lower dose of methtrexate tablets 20mg. i only started taking them last weekend so i'll have to see how i go.

sorry if this all seems very negative but i wanted you to have a realistic view of my experience. but as you will no doubt see others get on very well with this drug so the main thing is we are all different so our bodies tolerate or don't different drugs.
i hope i've let you see how i got on and i hope i haven't terrified you? i'm very sorry if i have.
sue

normie

hi Ive only tried one drug for my RA ( apart from pain killers and diclofenac, which i dont use these days, fingers crossed) It took nearly two years to get here building up the dose gradualy (over a year or maybe till i agreed to the injections) But as soon as i started injecting the methotrexate ( 25mg) Most of the pain went away. I still have the occasional flare up, mostly in my hands or fingers or sometimes my arm hurts. But they dont usualy last long. Maybe i have been one of the lucky ones, but i say give it a try, i dont have any side effects (well, almost none) maybe you will be lucky too.

lindalegs

Hi Emma,

I'm on 10mg Mtx tablets a week - I've responded so well to them that my Rheumy dropped my dose from 12.5mg. I get no stiffness in the morning anymore and I feel tons better - I'd forgotten what it was like to feel like this :roll: I do get the odd bad day occasionally but nothing compared to what life was like before Mtx.

I'm assuming your Rheumy is putting you straight onto injections because of your age and the modern day thinking that you treat RA/PA very aggressively with Dmards to avoid joint deformaties. In my case it was too late :roll:

As for side effects initially I had vomitting and headaches which lasted about a day and then settled down until I escalated the dose - my GP put me on antimetics to counteract this but I didn't need to take these for long.

I've had other drugs in the past but they aren't worth mentioning because they're not in line with today's treatments.

Hope this helps.

Luv Legs

vickyallan

emmarose33 wrote:

Hi,
I was just looking for people's opinions on certain drugs, if they've tried them, did they help?
Firstly methotrexate? If I can wean my little boy off the breast then I I'll start this. In injection form. I am not keen as I won't be allowed to drink (agggh!) but my consultant is desperate for me to start this.
Secondly - gold? Consultant says if I really don't want to go on MTX we could try gold injections first. Anyone had this?
Thirdly - has anyone tried accupuncture? Obviously this will be in addition to modern medicine, but I have heard it can be very helpful. Any success stories?
Cheers everyone.

Hi emmarose, i've had RA for 10 years, i've been on sulphasalazine from the start, they introduced plaqueline about 2 years later then methotrexate after my daughter was born 6 years ago. I've never had any problems taking the mxt although now i've just had a flare up in the last couple of months, had 2 injections, one at the top of my bum (not nice)!! then on monday of this week had to get one injected into my right wrist(very sore)!! they upped my dose of mxt to 17.5mg a couple of weeks ago still no side effects, now they are talking about upping it again to 20mgs. I've to wait + see how the injection works first, although not too great as right hand not any use at all at the moment. I will give it another couple of days but if not, next couple of weeks i might need to try 20mgs to see if that works. No person is the same, i've been quite lucky not to have had any side effects to the drugs, i did'nt realise till i came on this site that people take mxt by injection. Good luck + i hope everything works out for you, hope i've helped a little.