Burning joints/pain in knees, back and neck? Any ideas?

Hi guys,

28m here.

I had a CT scan in September for a stomach issue. The scan showed that I had some loading on the right side of my intestine but also showed that, without me knowing, my lower vertibrate is fused to my pelvis. I wasn't worried about it at all when it came up in the scan, it just explained a lack of mobility in my lower back that I blamed on being tall. The gastroenterologist did however write that it could be early ankylosing spondylitis  and referred me to a rheum. Again, i wasn't worried at all. it wasn't causing any pain (I was more concerned about my stomach issues which had kept me from my usual heavy exercise routine for the previous five months.) The stomach side of things I put down to a period of stress around May/June last year.

However, about 5 weeks before Christmas, I had some new issues. My eyes became severely dry (initially I put this down to a latent medication side effect). And a week later, I had a burning pain in my right elbow. Over the next few days, it seemed to spread to all my joints. It seemed to fade away after I was up and about but it seems to be getting worse.

The burning is still present when I wake in most of my joints (knees, elbows, wrists, hands) and pain wise, it's been fairly constant and has settled in my knees. I can feel a burning/pinching in them most of the time and it feels worse at rest, or when I first start walking, or if i stay on my feet in one place too long. Though sometimes I find a position where I feel okay.

In the past few days, I've started to have an increase in pain in my back and neck and I can hear a crunching sound in my lower neck and jaw.

This morning, when I woke up, my knuckles felt a little warm and mildly stiff to accompany the burning in a lot of my joints.

I've been backwards and forwards to the GP so I'm biding my time between appointments at the minute (can't really rush things with the NHS, no matter how much you want to know what's going on). Due to an ongoing issue with neutropenia, I have a blood test next week that was requested by a haematologist, which i believe will look for a wide array of different things. That's my next milestone before my first rheumatology appointment in March. My other blood tests have come back clear so far. So I really don't know what's going on.

Does anyone have any ideas what may cause the burning pain in all my joints? I can even feel it in my toes at times. I'm not sure about fibro as it seems to be confined to my joints and no muscle involvement.

Symptoms in total are:

Burning in seemingly all joints (dies down during the day and moves around quite a bit)

All over crepitus

Sharp pain in knees

Pain in neck and back seems to be present during the day now also.

Additional:

Dry tongue (tongue feels sandy and if I sleep with my mouth open, it sticks to my teeth. No sign of yeast)

Dry eyes

Gastro issues

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Hair has been shedding a lot, inc eye-lashes etc

It'd be greatly appreciated to hear if anyone has had any symptoms like this? The only thing that I have to go on at present is that "possible early AS".

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