Lesson 1: Exactly What is Fibromyalgia?

Diagnosis

As I stated in the beginning of this lesson, not all doctors accept fibromyalgia as a legitimate medical problem. This can lead to frustration for the sufferer, who cannot get relief and who often ends up thinking that it is "all in their head." Yet unless fibromyalgia is diagnosed, it cannot be adequately treated, since so many of the symptoms interact and can in fact be relieved by the correct medications. So it is crucial that anyone who believes they may suffer from this condition find a doctor who both understands the nature of fibro and is willing to treat it.

However, the criteria for a true diagnosis are complex.

A simple x-ray or blood test can't diagnose fibromyalgia. There are no definitive tests for fibro. The doctor should take blood tests but only to eliminate other possible causes for the symptoms that you are experiencing. Eliminating those is the first clue that we may be looking at fibromyalgia.

Having eliminated other possibilities, the doctor then looks to see if the patient has experienced widespread pain in all four quadrants of the body for at least three months, and displays many of the symptoms mentioned earlier in this lesson. The four quadrants that experience pain are the left and right sides of the body and pain above and below the waist.

Next we look at the common symptoms that fibro patients suffer from. Not every fibro patient experiences all of the symptoms, but most do suffer from the most common ones outlined previously.

Traditionally doctors diagnosed fibro if the patient was sensitive in 11 or more tender points In practice a diagnosis can still be accurate even if fewer points are sensitive to pressure as long as most of the other major symptoms are present.

While the diagnosis (as with so many illnesses) is not foolproof, a study was conducted using not only patients diagnosed with fibromyalgia and those with other diseases that mimic some of the symptoms, such as rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, and lupus. Applying the above diagnostic criteria doctors were correct in their diagnosis of fibromyalgia 88% of the time.

The diagnosis can be complicated because fibro patients often (but not always) also suffer from Chronic Fatigue syndrome (CFS). CFS patients must display severe fatigue for a minimum of 6 months, no matter how much they may try to rest. The other symptoms of the syndrome are similar to those of fibro: impaired memory or concentration, muscle and joint pain not caused by arthritis, tension or migraine headaches and pains that intensify after exertion. CFS patient also often suffer from swollen or tender lymph nodes in the neck area. If you have the lymph node problem and/or a sore throat chronically you may have both CFS and FMS - and you may also want your doctor to check for Lupus.

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