Saw my neuro yesterday and he has come up with a way outside the box idea as to what's going on with me. Now, before I go any further, I would like to say I trust and like my neuro very much. and he spends a tremendous amount of time with me, explaining anything, answering questions, and he is always open to me challenging him. Although admittly, he tends to confuse me sometimes as he can talk in circles.
In the last few months I have had 2 flairs that affected my right arm. Deeply intense pain that has moved down my arm making it impossible to move my arm, not necessarily due to weakness, but pain. Although once the pain subsided, weakness was present. Both times treated with steroids, which helped.
The theory he is looking into is shingles without the rash. He says the only real way to know for sure is a lumbar puncture to measure zoster titers. I'm not ready to go tbrough another LP at this point. The other thing he is doing is an eeg (or emg) I keep forgetting the right name for this....it's the zappy test looking for things such as peripheral neropathy. He says if he sees certain patterns with this, it may point in this direction, at which point we would look into what may be a long term therapy of anti virals, and during flairs, treating with anti virals and steroids.
I thought this theory was a little too outside the box for me, but sure enough once I research it, it is possible. The name I found for it is "zoster sin herpete".
So, what I do find interesting with this is the fact that I have had shigles twice, once as a young kid, and a very minor attack about 5 years ago. BUT, I never experienced the postherpatic pain with either of these episodes. My "first" poss MS attack happened a few years later in my left arm, which is almost identical to what happened to my right arm in the last few months. I had an eeg (or whatever it's called) done on the left arm which came back normal, which my neuro says means it's a central issue, not peripheral. So as you can see, it contradicts what he's suggesting now. (Yes we discussed this at length). I agreed to do the test anyway.
He also says that since shingles can attack basically any nerve, it could account for all of my problems, vision, facial numbness, arms, etc., and of course since its viral, fatigue.
I've tried to keep the post short and concise, but if I left out anything , or if I made it too short to understand, just say so.........
Has anyone heard of this, experienced this, etc.
In the last few months I have had 2 flairs that affected my right arm. Deeply intense pain that has moved down my arm making it impossible to move my arm, not necessarily due to weakness, but pain. Although once the pain subsided, weakness was present. Both times treated with steroids, which helped.
The theory he is looking into is shingles without the rash. He says the only real way to know for sure is a lumbar puncture to measure zoster titers. I'm not ready to go tbrough another LP at this point. The other thing he is doing is an eeg (or emg) I keep forgetting the right name for this....it's the zappy test looking for things such as peripheral neropathy. He says if he sees certain patterns with this, it may point in this direction, at which point we would look into what may be a long term therapy of anti virals, and during flairs, treating with anti virals and steroids.
I thought this theory was a little too outside the box for me, but sure enough once I research it, it is possible. The name I found for it is "zoster sin herpete".
So, what I do find interesting with this is the fact that I have had shigles twice, once as a young kid, and a very minor attack about 5 years ago. BUT, I never experienced the postherpatic pain with either of these episodes. My "first" poss MS attack happened a few years later in my left arm, which is almost identical to what happened to my right arm in the last few months. I had an eeg (or whatever it's called) done on the left arm which came back normal, which my neuro says means it's a central issue, not peripheral. So as you can see, it contradicts what he's suggesting now. (Yes we discussed this at length). I agreed to do the test anyway.
He also says that since shingles can attack basically any nerve, it could account for all of my problems, vision, facial numbness, arms, etc., and of course since its viral, fatigue.
I've tried to keep the post short and concise, but if I left out anything , or if I made it too short to understand, just say so.........
Has anyone heard of this, experienced this, etc.
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