New to Seronegative athritis

davidy83

Afternoon all,

I'm New to the community, I've suffered for about 4yrs with inflammation on the knees and recently had a carple tunnel diagnosis, I've mot been prescribed methotrexate and I am looking for what your thoughts are on this drug. Some affects you have experienced? Hints and tips to help?

Thank you

Dave

Baloo

@davidy83 I would like to know what happens too, so let us know.

One thing I know, with painkillers I feel my joints less and hence feel my muscles instead, so in the end after a few weeks I was stronger and for example more able to get out of a chair.

Another thing I noticed is my knees started to gradually loosen up by themselves, probably adapting to the stiffness in some way, so once I noticed this was happening, it became worth persisting over a year or so at various exercises until I found they loosened up enough I could get back on my bicycle.

Woofy

https://community.versusarthritis.org/discussion/62732/new-to-seronegative-athritis

Hi. Welcome to the gang. I have been taking Methotrexate for a year and I have been ok with it. It hasn’t been enough to get my pain under control, so the dose has been increased last week, and I will be injecting it myself tomorrow for the first time, and have been prescribed another tablet to take along side it.

davidy83

I feel for now I'm quite lucky as pain is not my concern the swelling of the knees is the problem. It seems anti inflammatory medicine doesn't help. I'm going to start taking the Mxt next Wednesday as Thursdays are always my days off and after reading comments on it it seems to be the right thing to do.

Mandin195

Hi I was diagnosed seronegative RA about 6 years ago. It became active out of the blue. I'd been for reflexology and there was one point that really hurt. I asked what that was and she looked at me and stopped. She said it was to do with my core and immune system and that I had gone drip white. A few days later I woke up and found every joint in my body ached. I could hardly walk down the garden. Blood tests done and numerous tablets later I was still aching but more mobile.

Long story short, I am now on 8 Methotrexate a week. I take on Tuesday night so if I feel rough I'm OK as Wednesday is my day off. I also take folic acid on the other 6 days of the week and occasionally need an couple of painkillers.

It works for me most of the time but I have odd flare ups and If I knock myself I bruise very easily and if it's knuckles they swell up.

noddingtonpete

Hello @Mandin195 and welcome to the Community.

Good to see that methotrexate is helping you and that you are managing to schedule it to have a manageable impact on your life.

Now you are here please keep posting and let us know how things are progressing. I would also recommend a look at our website which contains a lot of useful information on arthritis, treatments and Hints and Tips.

Best wishes

Peter

Arciere

Hi Dave

I’ve had a similar experience with a Seronegative diagnosis (it was ultrasound that proved it)

I found methotrexate unbearable due to how it made me feel mood wise. So I switched to Sulfasalazine which had a long uptake time and whilst I thought that wasn’t helping, coming off it was quite difficult pain wise. I’m now with Yuflyma. It’s early days, but I’m generally better save for fatigue and flare ups.