What To Expect With Lupus
With lupus there is no one part of the body that will definitely be affected or one part that will not. For starters what symptoms one has are based solely on how mild or severe the case of lupus the person has. Effects can be mild and the person may have an easy time of living with this disease. Or the effects may be severe and the person could require several aggressive medications to keep the discomforts and dangers under control. Most people live in the middle. But either way all lupus suffers will have some common discomforts.
There is more than one way that a person’s joints may cause pain. Usually it is from inflammation and swelling. This is another word for arthritis. It is one of the most common discomforts of lupus. As many as nine out of ten lupus sufferers will have some degree of arthritis. They usually suffer from it in their hands but sometimes it is in the wrists or feet. It can be worst upon rising in the morning and ease off during the day. Sometimes arthritis can be quite debilitating, but with lupus it usually does not get that serious.
The tendons can also be affected. When there is inflammation in the tendons they react by tightening. This can make the fingers, or toes, move unwillingly into odd positions. Fortunately, this is a rare affect.
As many as sixty five percent of lupus sufferers will have some kind of muscle pain. This is called myalgia. It is worst around the muscles that run between the knees and hips or one that go from the neck to the elbow. There can be inflammation of the muscles, rarely, but when there is it can be more serious than a bout of myalgia.
Everyone who knows anything about lupus is familiar with the way it affects the skin. Nearly sixty five percent of people with this disease have rashes of some kind. This can be anything from the malar or butterfly rash that is most noticeable as it runs across the cheeks and bridge of the nose or it can be hives, mouth sores or altered pigmentation. This change in pigmentation can be either patches that lighten or darken the skin. Around thirty five percent of lupus patients deal with a symptom that turns their fingers blue when they get too cold or the person is feeling overstressed. This is called Raynaud’s phenomenon,
Ten percent of lupus patients will have seizures. Thirty three percent will have positive tests that will show abnormalities in the cerebrospinal fluid. Renal failure will happen to five percent of them. Twenty percent of those with lupus will have to deal with arthropathy which though it is not destructive of the bone mass can cause deformities traced back to the disease. This disease can even cause a false result if someone is having a test for syphilis; giving a positive when there should not be one. Still despite all the things that a patient might have to deal with treatments today are able to allow those with lupus to lead fairly normal lives.
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