Category: Fibromyalgia Conditions

Fibromyalgia is a chronic disease that has many different characteristics such as pain in the spine, hips, shoulders, neck, and yes- even a low-grade fever. Fibromyalgia can occur in all individuals, regardless of age or gender, but does occur more often in women between the ages of 30 and 59. The exact cause of fibromyalgia is not known, which has made it very difficult to figure out a cure for it. Another thing that complicates this is the fact that some fibromyalgia symptoms are also present in other diseases/disorders.

Fibromyalgia and fever are actually related because an individual who is suffering from fibromyalgia can actually have a low-grade fever at any given time. There isn’t really any specific evidence that connects the two but there is that possibility that fibromyalgia can cause a fever.

Individuals who have fibromyalgia also have a very weak immune system and infections can be easily picked up while symptoms are flared up. These infections can actually lead to a much higher fever. Additionally, the severe muscle pain/tingling that is common in individuals with fibromyalgia can cause fever. Your skin will get very hot and you may or may not start sweating. Additionally, though you may feel hot and think you have a fever, the thermometer will read normally. So, you could feel hot- but not really have a fever.

Fever related to fibromyalgia symptoms can also cause your glands to swell up. This happens in both individuals with fibromyalgia and those who are only experiencing a fever. Additionally, joint pain could flare up if you’re experiencing a mild fever.

However, typically the fevers are very mild and are not the main reason for discomfort in individuals with fibromyalgia. In fact, most individuals don’t even realize that they do have a fever, but are more focused on the symptoms that are causing them the most extreme discomfort.

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In some cases, individuals with fibromyalgia could start shivering before, during, or after experiencing a fever. There isn’t really any known medication that can curb a fever with fibromyalgia, so the individual will have to continue with their normal course of treatment, despite having a low grade (or high grade) fever.

The only way to avoid having a fever with fibromyalgia symptoms is by taking care to reduce the other symptoms of your fibromyalgia. Make sure to take part in regular physical exercise in order to reduce muscle stiffness. Additionally, make sure that you are consuming a proper diet that will give you plenty of energy. You will also want to make sure that you get adequate sleep, which will help you to be relaxed and help to reduce the symptoms of fatigue and such.

Consuming a balanced diet- as in consuming lots of fruits and vegetables especially- can help to reduce the symptoms of fibromyalgia and fever. Vegetables have lots of fiber, which is essential for increasing metabolism and fruits have vitamins and minerals that help with the repair and rebuilding of the muscles. As an individual with fibromyalgia, you should take care to avoid caffeine, processed foods, soft drinks, refined carbohydrates, and other junk food.

For those individuals who are suffering from not sleeping and high levels of stress, medications that facilitate sleep and relaxation methods can be wonderful in reducing those symptoms of fibromyalgia, which can contribute to feeling feverish.

Both not getting adequate sleep and levels of stress are related because people who are stressed out don’t get the proper amount of sleep. The less sleep you’re able to get, the more likely you are to react negatively to stress. Therefore, relaxation methods, such as massage will help you to relax, which will help you to sleep much better.

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Additionally, massage can help serve to decrease pain, which helps to alleviate other symptoms. In times of extreme lack of sleep, you can use sleep medication, but be sure that you don’t become dependent upon them entirely as a way to get some sleep. Also, keep in mind that sleeping pills do come with some undesirable side effects.

In order to relieve the fever that results from the pain and other symptoms of fibromyalgia, you could consider acupuncture as an option. This will typically relieve the pain in the tender spots and may very well serve to reduce stress. Both massage and physical therapy actually regulate the neurotransmitters in the brain, which help your body to actually have a much higher pain threshold. This also leads to the individual being able to more effectively overcome stress and pain.

Individuals who have fibromyalgia are prone to experiencing both spells of fever and spells of chills on occasion. In some cases, the individuals will have a fever the entire time that they’re suffering from fibromyalgia, most will actually never once experience a fever. Physicians say that individuals who are in the more advanced stages of fibromyalgia are less affected by fever and chills, and those in the early stages are more likely to be affected.

In conclusion, fibromyalgia is a chronic disease that has many different characteristics such as pain in the spine, hips, shoulders, neck, and yes- even a low-grade fever. Fibromyalgia can occur in all individuals, regardless of age or gender, but does occur more often in women between the ages of 30 and 59. The exact cause of fibromyalgia is not known, which has made it very difficult to figure out a cure for it. Another thing that complicates this is the fact that some fibromyalgia symptoms are also present in other diseases/disorders.

Fibromyalgia and fever are actually related because an individual who is suffering from fibromyalgia can actually have a low-grade fever at any given time. There isn’t really any specific evidence that connects the two but there is that possibility that fibromyalgia can cause a fever.

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For More Information Related to Fibromyalgia Visit below sites:

References:

Fibromyalgia Contact Us Directly

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Official Fibromyalgia Blogs

Click here to Get the latest Chronic illness Updates

Fibromyalgia Stores

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Fibromyalgia, a painful condition affecting approximately 10 million people in the U.S., is not imaginary after all, as some doctors have believed. A discovery, published this month in PAIN MEDICINE (the journal of the American Academy of Pain Medicine), clearly now demonstrates that fibromyalgia may have a rational biological basis located in the skin.

Fibromyalgia is a severely debilitating affliction characterized by widespread deep tissue pain, tenderness in the hands and feet, fatigue, sleep disorders, and cognitive decline. However, routine testing has been largely unable to detect a biological basis for fibromyalgia, and standard diagnosis is based upon subjective patient pain ratings, further raising questions about the true nature of the disease.

For many years, the disorder was believed to be psychosomatic (“in the head”) and often attributed to patients’ imagination or even faking illness. Currently approved therapeutics that provide at least partial relief to some fibromyalgia patients are thought to act solely within the brain where imaging techniques have detected hyperactivity of unknown origin referred to as “central sensitization.” However, an underlying cause has not been determined, leaving many physicians still in doubt about the true origins or even the existence of the disorder.

Now, a breakthrough discovery by scientists at Integrated Tissue Dynamics LLC (Intidyn), as part of a fibromyalgia study based at Albany Medical College, has provided a biological rationale for this enigmatic disease. The small biotechnology research company, founded by neuroscientists Dr. Frank L. Rice and Dr. Phillip J. Albrecht, reports on a unique peripheral neurovascular pathology consistently present in the skin of female fibromyalgia patients which may be a driving source of the reported symptoms.

“Instead of being in the brain, the pathology consists of excessive sensory nerve fibers around specialized blood vessel structures located in the palms of the hands,” said Dr. Rice, President of Intidyn and the senior researcher on the study. “This discovery provides concrete evidence of a fibromyalgia–specific pathology which can now be used for diagnosing the disease, and as a novel starting point for developing more effective therapeutics.”

Nerve Endings Come In Many Forms

Three years ago, Intidyn scientists published the discovery of an unknown nervous system function among the blood vessels in the skin in the journal PAIN.

As Dr. Rice explained, “we analyzed the skin of a particularly interesting patient who lacked all the numerous varieties of sensory nerve endings in the skin that supposedly accounted for our highly sensitive and richly nuanced sense of touch. Interestingly, however, this patient had a surprisingly normal function in day-to-day tasks.

But, the only sensory endings we detected in his skin were those around the blood vessels”. Dr. Rice continued, “We previously thought that these nerve endings were only involved in regulating blood flow at a subconscious level, yet here we had evidence that the blood vessel endings could also contribute to our conscious sense of touch… and also pain.”

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Now, in collaboration with renowned Albany Medical Center neurologist and pain specialist Dr. Charles E. Argoff, the study primary investigator, and his collaborators Dr. James Wymer also at Albany Medical College and Dr. James Storey of Upstate Clinical Research Associates in Albany, NY, clinical research proposals were funded by Forest Laboratories and Eli Lilly.

Both pharmaceutical companies have developed FDA-approved medications with similar functions (Serotonin/Norepinephrine Reuptake Inhibitors, SNRI) that provide at least some degree of relief for many fibromyalgia patients.

“Knowing how these drugs were supposed to work on molecules in the brain,” Dr. Albrecht added, “we had evidence that similar molecules were involved in the function of nerve endings on the blood vessels. Therefore, we hypothesized that fibromyalgia might involve a pathology in that location”. As the results demonstrate, they were correct.

To analyze the nerve endings, Drs. Rice, Albrecht, and postdoctoral researcher Dr. Quanzhi Hou used their unique microscopic technology to study small skin biopsies (less than half the size of a pencil eraser) collected from the palms of fibromyalgia patients, who were being diagnosed and treated by Drs. Argoff, Wymer, and Storey.

The study was limited to women, who have over twice the occurrence of fibromyalgia than men. What the team uncovered was an enormous increase in sensory nerve fibers at specific sites within the blood vessels of the skin. These critical sites are tiny muscular valves, called arteriole-venule (AV) shunts, which form a direct connection between arterioles and venules.

As Dr. Rice describes their function, “We are all taught that oxygenated blood flows from arterioles to capillaries, which then convey the deoxygenated blood to the venules. The AV shunts in the hand are unique in that they create a bypass of the capillary bed for the major purpose of regulating body temperature.”

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A Thermostat for the Skin

In humans, these types of shunts are unique to the palms of our hands and soles of our feet which work like the radiator in a car. Under warm conditions, the shunts close down to force blood into the capillaries at the surface of the skin in order to radiate heat from the body, and our hands get sweaty. Under cold conditions, the shunts open wide allowing blood to bypass the capillaries in order to conserve heat, and our hands get cold, and put on gloves.

According to Dr. Albrecht, “the excess sensory innervation may itself explain why fibromyalgia patients typically have especially tender and painful hands. But, in addition, since the sensory fibers are responsible for opening the shunts, they would become particularly active under cold conditions, which are generally very bothersome to fibromyalgia patients.”

A role in regulating blood flow throughout the body

Although they are mostly limited to the hands and feet, the shunts likely have another important function that could account for the widespread deep pain, achiness, and fatigue that occurs in fibromyalgia patients.

“In addition to involvement in temperature regulation, an enormous proportion of our blood flow normally goes to our hands and feet. Far more than is needed for their metabolism” noted Dr. Rice. “As such, the hands and the feet act as a reservoir from which blood flow can be diverted to other tissues of the body, such as muscles when we begin to exercise.

Therefore, the pathology discovered among these shunts in the hands could be interfering with blood flow to the muscles throughout the body. This mismanaged blood flow could be the source of muscular pain and achiness, and the sense of fatigue which is thought to be due to a build-up of lactic acid and low levels of inflammation in fibromyalgia patients. This, in turn, could contribute to the hyperactivity in the brain.”

Dr. Albrecht also points out that alterations of normal blood flow may underlie other fibromyalgia symptoms, such as non-restful sleep or cognitive dysfunctions. “The data do appear to fit with other published evidence demonstrating blood flow alterations to higher brain centers and the cerebral cortex of fibromyalgia patients” he stated.

Senior Research Chair of the Alan Edwards Center for Pain Research at McGill University, Dr. Gary Bennett, commented after seeing the results that “It is exciting that something has finally been found. We can hope that this new finding will lead to new treatments for fibromyalgia patients who now receive little or no relief from any medicine.”

This discovery of a distinct tissue pathology demonstrates that fibromyalgia is not “all in your head”, which should provide an enormous relief to fibromyalgia patients while changing the clinical opinion of the disease and guiding future approaches for successful treatments.

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For More Information Related to Fibromyalgia Visit below sites:

References:

Fibromyalgia Contact Us Directly

Click here to Contact us Directly on Inbox

Official Fibromyalgia Blogs

Click here to Get the latest Chronic illness Updates

Fibromyalgia Stores

Click here to Visit Fibromyalgia Store

Fibromyalgia is typically characterized by widespread pain, fatigue, headaches, irritable bowel syndrome, inability to get refreshing sleep, waking up tired and stiff, and developing cognitive disturbances including lack of concentration and clumsiness, dizziness, etc.

Fibromyalgia syndrome is a chronic and long-term condition that has no cure. About 10 million people are currently diagnosed with this disorder. Although 9 out of 10 people diagnosed are women, men also get this disorder.

Fibromyalgia association with other conditions

Studies have shown that fibromyalgia is also associated with several other conditions. Typically some patients with fibromyalgia also experience dryness of the cornea or eyes and mouth.

The presence of ocular discomfort or eye dryness and grittiness is one of the more common complaints of fibromyalgia compared to oral or mouth dryness. Studies have shown that there may be alteration in the formation of tears when compared to the general population.

Sjogren’s syndrome

A syndrome condition called Sjogren’s syndrome is typically characterized by dry eyes and the inability to form tears. It has been seen, however, that fibromyalgia patients with dry eyes and dry mouth do not satisfy the criteria for diagnosis of Sjogren’s syndrome. They are commonly diagnosed with Dry eye and mouth syndrome (DEMS).

Corneal sensitivity and corneal changes

A study looking at corneal sensitivity and corneal changes among fibromyalgia patients shows that the sensitivity is the same irrespective of the age of the fibromyalgia patients. This could be due to the deterioration of the nerves and sensory systems of the eye.

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Association between fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue and Sjogren’s syndrome

The study also finds an association between fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and Sjogren’s syndrome.

Tear secretion is markedly decreased in fibromyalgia but not to the extent of other dry eye conditions. Further, the eye becomes more sensitive to high levels of carbon dioxide, heat, and cold compared to normal persons.

Normal tear formation

Normal tear formation is controlled by the lacrimal functional unit that includes the cornea, conjunctiva, accessory lacrimal glands, and meibomian glands. These are all connected with a fine network of nerves.

If any portion of this nerve network is impaired, tear production may be hampered. This is something that occurs in fibromyalgia patients.

Dry mouth

Fibromyalgia is closely associated with irritable bowel syndrome and reduced salivary secretions leading to dry mouth. Dry mouth in itself is rarely present. It is more commonly associated with dry eyes in patients with fibromyalgia.

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For More Information Related to Fibromyalgia Visit below sites:

References:

Fibromyalgia Contact Us Directly

Click here to Contact us Directly on Inbox

Official Fibromyalgia Blogs

Click here to Get the latest Chronic illness Updates

Fibromyalgia Stores

Click here to Visit Fibromyalgia Store