How many diagnosed?

Hello @0499eric good question. My osteoarthritis was a gradual increase in pain until I eventually went to see my GP and got diagnosed. My reactive arthritis was more of an emergency and came on overnight - luckily you could still get same day GP appointments at that time so was able to get in and get diagnosed. Nowadays? Who knows how lonfg it would take.

How I was diagnosed - I had a fall outside and I was in shock for a short while and couldn't get up. I eventually managed to and I was in absolute agony. After talking to my local NHS falls team I was assessed at home a few days later. The lady who assessed me advised me to go to A&E and get an X-ray because of the pain and my lack of movement. She thought I have broken my hip. So I went to my local Minor Injuries hospital which is only a minute away in a car. I had a couple of x-rays which showed no fracture but it did show rhumatoid arthritis in my right hip. I went to physio a couple of weeks later, had another two x-rays and was told my arthritis was too advanced for physio and showed me the x-rays which showed there was no cartilage at all in the hip joint. This had been wearing away for years without causing me too much of a problem. So now I'm waiting for a total hip replacement right side. I already use high pain relief in the form of tablets and liquid morphine and pregabalin. So these were tweaked and doses changed but I'm coming off the pregabalin because I don't think it's doing much for me. Neither is the morphine but it does take the edge off. My pain score is 8 or 9 and some days 10. Pain has me climbing the walls at times, it's so unbearable.

I need this replacement doing as quickly as possible because despite my own chronic health conditions I'm the sole carer for my wife at home and at times it's really demanding and I have to physically move by er around as a dead weight because she can't do much to help me, bless her.

So, if I hadn't had that fall in April 2024 I'd possibly be wombelling around doing stuff.

Hi @0499eric,

Interesting question. You'll find that we all might have slightly different stories due to different backgrounds and experiences but one thing is surely common - diagnosed late. In fairness it might be quite tricky, even more so within NHS which is still suffering of sex and age bias and not being very good at listening to the patients. I personally got diagnosed after almost 2 years of pain, a year of severe pain - and that's apparently quite quick! Having other autoimmune conditions and early menopause my hip pain was being explained as part of Hashimoto's and of course menopause, some even tried to say that I'm just "overdoing being active" (being quite athletic) and "at this age" (45-46 then) I need more rest. Finally after being referred for second opinion to another Endocrine consultant and me really stressing that the pain (and stiffness) is horrible, ESPECIALLY AT NIGHT (2 or 3 am -goodbye sleep), he decided to refer me to Rheumatology despite his opinion: "I don't think it's arthritis - it normally starts with smaller joints". Another long wait (but only a few months) and I got to see my current rheumatology consultant. She asked me some 5 questions and within 15 minutes put the probable diagnosis of psoriatic arthritis. This was based on a medical history and later confirmed by MRI. The thing about any type of spondyloarthritis is that no one would really request HLA-B27 gene blood test - not necessarily conclusive and there is no rheumatoid factor like in RA. Also 60% of patients with this type of arthritis would have the inflammatory markers ESR and CRP within normal range, so easily dismissed by GPs and other specialties' consultants. It's only about a thorough medical history: other autoimmune problems (in my case Hashimoto's and pernicious anaemia), carefully considering all symptoms (even malfunctioning gut being a good indicator) and imaging. And that's my story. Patients really need to be listened to and we need to listen to our bodies, without trying to brush things off and persist when things are not right.