Avonex pen intra-muscular injections Hi guys, My first post here so apologies if I’m in the wrong subsection. My question is about intra-muscular injections of Avonex. Specifically, have any of you guys experienced “missing the muscle” and “not feeling the benefit” at all? I’ll try and explain what I mean. I’ve been taking Avonex for 53 weeks now, every Friday night after I get home from work. Within a few hours I feel shivery, cold and then sweaty/hot. I usually take paracetamol and go to bed early. The next day I’m almost always hung over, tired, head ache, muscle ache like I did too many sit-ups the day before and need to sleep until 10am or sometimes even noon before I can pull myself together. However, once in a while, seemingly at random, I can spring out of bed at 6am with the kids and feel no ill effects at all. No head ache, no muscle ache, nothing. Would you share my suspicions that I’ve “missed”? I use the auto-injector pen and try and switch between left thigh and right thigh each week. How come I sometimes have zero effects when something like 26 weeks of 27 it knocks me for six like I drank a bottle of wine the night before (hangover) or just got the flu? My MS nurse thought I might be injecting into fatty tissue in my leg rather that the muscle on those occasions. What do you think? Your experience would we appreciated!
Does it matter if you miss the target muscle? I don’t know. But if it relieves the symptoms I’d do it on purpose. My hubby injected into my sciatic nerve once and which caused so much pain I couldn’t even get out of bed. Couldn’t lay down when I was up, couldn’t get up when I was down. Couldn’t sit down if I was standing, couldn’t stand if I was sitting. Painful isn’t the word. That’s one missed target to avoid.
But I don’t know the answer to your question, I never used the pen, I had the harpoons.
I’m just worried that “effects” and “side-effects” are two sides of the same coin. So if some weeks I’m getting nothing it’s not affording me the benefits of my medication in preventing/lessening amy relapses.
The sciatic nerve in your thigh? Ouch! I can only imagine that must have been awful. I try and crouch half way between sitting on a chair and standing to find a tense bit of muscle under the skin, then mark it with a pen, then sit down so it’s relaxed and inject. But ot doesn’t seem to work 100% of the time. Maybe once every 3 months or so I get nothing… What are “the harpoons”? Just normal syringes as opposed to the auto-injector pen?
No in my buttock. Hubby used to inject me in the buttock. I gave up injecting in the thigh when the needle hit my thigh bone and I hit the ceiling. The sciatic nerves run through the buttocks.
The harpoons are the flipping great needles on the standard prefilled syringes. Great big HUGE ENORMOUS knitting needles - monsters!
After a harpoon hit a bone I was given smaller needles but I never trusted it again and hubby injected me in the bum - until he injected a nerve.
I don’t take Avonex now because it sent me mad and caused seizures. It’s the reason I’m epileptic so think carefully about it. There are side effects the medics don’t tell you about.
Hi Florence I didn’t know you could inject it anywhere other than the thigh. The auto-injector pens are pretty good. The needle is only about 1-2cm long and you don’t really see it as it stays in the sheath before you plunge it in and then into a cap when you’re done. There’s definitely lots of side effects with Avonex like fatigue, flu symptoms, hangover, headaches, shivers and mood / anger feelins on the day after injecting but some of those could be the MS itself I feel. Who knows. It’s got to be better than taking a gamble on another relapse. What did they put you on after Avonex?