Usually it is
rather difficult to make fibromyalgia diagnosis.
It is connected with the fact that this disease has a lot of symptoms which
match with the symptoms of many other rheumatic conditions.
Experience of
quite a numerous number of people, who now have fibromyalgia
diagnosis, shows that they visited a lot of different specialists before
they know their disease for sure. It is almost important for doctors to make
the fibromyalgia diagnosis only on the base
of two main symptoms of this condition which include fatigue and pain. These
symptoms overlap with the symptoms of many other diseases. For example, the
first symptom – fatigue – is a common feeling which is experienced by people
who suffer from arthritis and rheumatic diseases. This unpleasant state of the
individual’s health may be caused by several reasons. Among the most popular
ones it is possible to distinguish such items as poor sleep, stress, chronic
pain, depression or anxiety, inflammation, poor activity, some diets etc. So
you see that a lot of different diseases may cause fatigue. At the same time a
lot of listened above causes of fatigue are characteristic features of
fibromyalgia. That is why it is important for doctors who are specialized in arthritis and related diseases (rheumatologists) to take into consideration all
these factors before making fibromyalgia diagnosis.
Diagnosing fibromyalgia is rather difficult not only for
one reason that you already know. It is also connected with the current
situation when no diagnostic laboratory test for this disease is available.
Unfortunately even in our XXI century it is impossible to find out real
physiological reasons of pain in the complicated person’s organism. This leads
to inability in diagnosing some diseases like fibromyalgia. Some doctors may
conclude that pain of their patients is not real because of the absence of
generally accepted objective tests. Also the other case is possible when the
doctor who swore to treat people and help them with the health problems can
only answer that he would like to help but cannot do anything or only a
little.
Luckily there
exist some criteria for making fibromyalgia
diagnosis. For doctors who are familiar with the condition of
fibromyalgia it is not really difficult to make such a diagnosis basing on two
criteria. The first criterion is connected with the time during which you feel
the pain. That is why if you are disturbing by pain over three month, this pain
has a widespread character it is impossible to tell your rheumatologist about
this. Maybe exactly on this basement the diagnosis would be made. Widespread
character of the pain means that all four quadrants of your body are affected
by pain. If you experience pain in your right and left sides of the body and
above and below the waist it is an “alarm bell” for you. In this case you are
to make an appointment in the doctor’s office. The second criterion is the
presence of tender points. There are eighteenth of them on the individual’s
body. They are located in the areas of neck, shoulders, elbows, back, hips,
chest, arms, legs and knees. All of them are bilateral, that is why under the
condition of this disease you will experience pain at the right and left sides
of the body in the same location.
