Hi - just wondered if anyone had any views on my symptoms and any suggestions for awful pain/ache in back of knees.
Firstly, my experience so far has been:
December bad cold, then woke up with pins and needles from chest downwards. Two days later infamous MS hug strated and numbness of torso and parts of legs. Over two -three week period these symtoms went to be replaced by pins and neeedles and weakness in both hands. Had MRI which found brain clear but demyelination of c3. I will be re-mri-ed in September. I was offered a lumbar puncture but declined as 3 months after onset of symptoms meant may not be conclusive. Neuro unsure if post-viral or ms-type condition. Prior to onset i had had bowel issues and moments of dizziness. the last two times I had ever been to doctors for me - not very often! Had been for numbness in right leg about 2 years ago and bladder issues about 1 year ago. Any ideas of what all this may amount to?
The consequence of this is lack of position sense in hands - poor grip, hard to write etc…Tiredness and over the last couple of weeks really bad aches in the back of my knees and at times ankles. This comes on from about 4 o’clock onwards and is better after sleeping. Has anyone any suggestions about how to manage this?
Thanks for reading this - the forum has been such a place of information, humour and advice. Often it is far more informative than the medics I have encountered!!!
My first thought was to wonder if the neuro knew about your earlier symptoms because I have a feeling that the heavy cold in December could have been a red herring. Demyelination can be triggered by a virus (see, eg, ADEM), but it sounds like your cold, if it had any influence at all and wasn’t just a coincidence, triggered a relapse and not a one off attack. Saying that, even if the neuro had known and was thinking like me, he/she couldn’t really have diagnosed MS with those MRI results anyway as the McDonald criteria stipulate at least two areas of demyelination. So you’d still be waiting for another MRI, although you might have a diagnosis of ‘probable/possible MS’ rather than nothing. As the problem with your hands started only a few months ago, there is still a very good chance that they will continue to improve - it’s quite normal for symptoms to keep improving up to a year or even more in some cases. I think the best thing to do about your knee/ankle pain is to see your GP and, between you, try to work out what might be causing it, eg it might be muscular (eg spasticity), it might be neuropathic or it might be skeletal because of the way you are walking. What type of pain you are having will tell the GP what to do about it - meds and/or physio. It may also mean that it would be sensible to ask for an earlier appointment with your neuro, but see what your GP thinks. Probably best to get an appointment with your GP at a time when it is normally bad - so the GP can see it “in action”. Karen x
Knee pain becomes common as theer is constant impact in the knee, training and exercises, physical exercises, yoga etc can definetly help to improve and strengthen the muscles at th eback side of the knees. I found a book on knee pain, you can check that by following the bellow link http://www.amazon.com/Beating-Patellar-Tendonitis-Treatment-Pain-free/dp/1491049731