Can do less each year.

Thank you for responding. I REALLY appreciate it. MAY NOT be fun, but at least I know it is not just me.

No, it is not just you! Erika (USA)

THANKS! I am 73!

PAM, I always feel I may need higher doses. BUT at least prednisone helps!

Pam my hip was very painful for most of 2017-2018. My Dr. kept ignoring it until I finally insisted on an MRI. Prior to an MRI here they want a current x-ray. I went for it and the next day my Drs. office called to say that they had heard from the MRI clinic. The x-ray showed I did not need an MRI but that I needed a new hip asap. In Aug. 2018 I had a hip replacement and have had no hip pain since recovering from the surgery.

I am 72 and I do not feel our age is the significant factor in our gradual decline in abilities. I think it is a consequence of the PMR causing such debilitation. I see many of my friends who are my age and they have much more energy and get up and go than I do.

I am trying my best to enjoy my new normal.

I had an MRI last fall. It showed a possible tear in the labrum, nothing else, which the ortho dismissed. I saw a chiropractor and he ended up working on my piraformis. Now the hip pain is intense after a long day. I've never had morning pain with my PMR. I find it unusual. I calked my rhumy and insisted on an appt. and see him tomorrow. I asked for an xray and bloodwork before I come in.

Hi Pam, like Carol-Ann I had hip pain and my GP kept saying it was the PMR. In the end I went privately to an orthopaedic surgeon who said it is your hip even before he x-rayed it! Have you had your hip x-rayed at all? As Carol-Ann says you do not need an MRI scan.

I have an appt today and im asking for one! Let you know what is said.

Good luck!

Pam, last summer I did tear my hip labrum, strained piriformis and SI joint. Very painful couldn't get comfortable. Had a number of Epidural Steroid Injections that seems to have done the job, good luck we don't need this on top of PMR. 🙂

Pam, different from one doctor to another, the specialist I went would not even see me with out a MRI.

That is how he knew I had the tear and strains.

I saw the specialist first!

Ptolemy, healthcare is crazy I have to see my PCP to get a referral to see the specialist. Which is sometimes very difficult, hard to get appointments. So to beat the system we have go around it, crazy! You have to keep smiling. 🙂

Hi Michdonn, come to UK it is becoming non existent it seems. There is a new horror story in the press every day. I put a lot of it down to bad management and ancient computer systems that do not talk to each other. Appointments can take for ever. Occassionally you see the most fantastic things happening in surgery for example so I suppose it is not all bad.

Ptolemy, there are many people in this country who have no health care at all. I am retired from AT&T and health insurance is one of my benefits. We know several people who have not seen a doctor in years and some who just go to emergency room if they have a health issue. Plus the cost of drugs here is ridiculous, many people here go to Mexico or Canada if their drugs are not covered by insurance . I don't know what the answer is, but the system is definitely broke! I thought it was better there than here. What a mess!

I must admit, people do say it is worse in the US. It is now getting to the point that there seems a total shambles here. Having it free sounds wonderful, but there are a lot of downsides as they are now producing lists of things they do not include. They are trying to put people off having hip and knee replacements and cataract surgery it seems. I think the aim may be to get people to go privately.

It's definitely better in countries like Canada and the UK, but in the UK especially it looks like the two tiers - those who can afford it can go private - has done what we have fought very hard against in Canada: resulted in two classes of patients. I know there's a lot of pressure to allow doctors to set up private practice but they aren't allowed. Also the health companies in the US salivate at the prospect of being allowed to set up shop in Canada, but so far we've kept that from happening. There are many things which we really have to get privately, not covered, most dental and eye care, for example, although apparently my eye care is covered by MSI, not sure why, and some children's dental care is covered. If you want a publicly funded physiotherapist be prepared to wait a year - so I don't. Those who can, carry extra insurance to cover the many things not covered by our medicare, including medicine.

It is not just the people who can afford it in UK anymore although a lot of companies and individuals pay for private insurance. People are in such pain they are taking out loans to have an op. Some people even go abroad. France has been offering very good deals on hips for UK people recently. I suppose if the private sector were cancelled things would be even worse. The NHS are using private hospitals to help them out at the moment.

A lot of people think health care in Canada is free. Believe me, it's not! We pay for our health care though our taxes!

As the costs of medical and medical support services rise, we see a reduction in the benefits covered. Or, the percentage of costs covered is reduced and we have to pay more deductible. Some of us are fortunate to have supplemental health care from employers (usually cost shared premiums) or through government if 65 or older. Again as costs go up benefits are reduced.

Wait lists in Canada are just as bad as everywhere else and vary from city to city and province to province. I'm in the midst of a wait of 2 1/2 years for an endoscopy in a major city in Western Canada. My need is not urgent, however, I was told by my physician that even if it was urgent the wait would still be over a year.

The reason we haven't allowed this in Canada is because it's believed, and I think validly, that allowing private medicine to exist alongside the public system will lead to gutting of the public system. Because of the proximity of the USA we have to be super vigilant. It's not like we have a lot of other countries across a small body of water which also have publicly funded medical care. If private services are allowed here, because of treaties with the US we open the floodgates to their private system.

I live in the United States and am 73, on MEDICARE and have SUPPLEMENTAL INSURANCE to cover what medicare does not. We have very good coverage and I can see whatever kind of doctor I need to. Yes, we pay for our medicare coverage and insurance, but it is worth it for what they provide including, surgeries, knee replacement, hopitalizations, doctor appointments, prescriptions, etc. I feel fortunate. Linda

It really doesn't help to have our system being run by politicians and businessmen without input from the medical providers, let alone the patients. It all seems to be about saving money, never mind that we could save the most money by providing very good preventative care and making sure people could live healthy lives with adequate food and shelter. It's about a lot more than whether we have a GP or not. Trouble is today's politicians don't remember what it was like in days before medicare, human memory is short.

I have recently had reframed a large, beautiful Chinese embroidery given to my father by a grateful patient in days before medicare. He often got payment in kind - a wheel of cheese, a hunk of venison. No doubt he would have appreciated these gifts, but they were given because the patients didn't have money to pay the bill. They gave him some of their farm produce, meat they had hunted themselves, or perhaps a family heirloom as the embroidery may have been. Life wasn't easy for either the patients or the doctors, especially in small towns or rural communities. We've forgotten this. I was still in my teens when medicare was introduced. I remember few years later an acquaintance saying she would have lost her eyesight were it not for medicare, otherwise she couldn't have afforded the treatment, this at a time when we all remembered what it was like to have to find the money to pay the doctor.

Anhaga, I worked for a Canadian company and heard some of discussions, I was working out of the US and used my retirement benefits, some people wanted the company befits in the US, saying to difficult to use the Canadian system. Plus some guys sneaked down to US , because it was faster. I also worked for a German company, never heard any complaints in Germany. I don't know if any country has a perfect system. I am just happy I have what I have, because those that have to use the government system are always complaining any we have a lot of people with no coverage. 1🙂

Ptolemy, nothing is free, it is either government sponsored or private one way or other we are paying. The question is what is the best system. I have my coverage as part of my retirement benefits which is not the best, but we can live with it. They are and have reducing some coverage, but in fairness have also added some things. 🙂

It is free in UK if you don't pay tax and are on benefits. I suppose it is great that the person who is homeless can get the same service as a multi-millionaire. It is just that no one seems to be getting a good service, rich or poor, in a lot of cases nowadays.

Jean, I have a six wait for my colonoscopy and endoscopy, twofor morning, private doctor, private facility. Covered by my insurance. But if I didn't have this insurance I might be in trouble. 🙂

Ptolemy, the multi millionaire will fly to the US and get the best medical care money can buy, in fact millionaires do from all over the world. 🙂

Sounds suspiciously like trochanteric bursitis to me - and it responds best to local steroid injections. That is how I deal with it and that holds for up to a year or too, allowing a lower oral management dose of pred.

Much in the UK at present is due to the B-word - loads of people are coming home because of the uncertainty - so now the gubmint that assured everyone that they would cut immigration is starting to realise you can't just cut the numbers because they don't have home-grown sources. It takes a long time to train all levels of healthcare staff - and it also costs money.

I have nothing against private medicine for some things - the deterioration of the NHS started when Labour took pay-beds out of NHS hospitals on principle. The state sector piggy-backed - and still does to some extent - on the funding that followed private patients. I had superb monitoring during pregnancy in Germany where the systems are more mixed - OK the state funded patient had her fancy u/s scan at 11pm while the private patient got it at a more civilised time but we both got it.

Except it isn't always the best because it is the most expensive - plenty of figures to back that up.

I think private medicine in UK is really to jump the queue in general, emergency medicine definitely use the NHS.

It was Gordan Brown who got 26 billion pounds from his auction of 3G, brilliant idea of auctioning it and then giving it to the NHS, what did they do fritter it away on salaries for expensive advisors and managers.

I'm almost done with physical therapy for a surgical repair of a torn labrum, full tear in the gluteous medius and bursectomy of bursa sac in my left hip. It was a very successful way to deal with a high level of pain I had prior to surgery. Steroid injections weren't working anymore. I'm very happy being pain free there now.

Eileenh, I cannot argue that, but they come from all over the world for the most expensive medical care!🙂 We do have the most expensive.

Hi Pam,

Sorry nothing is working. im in same boat five hears in. Have you read or heard anything about PMR responding to antibiotics? I recently heard this but cant find a link. thanks.

jeannae

HI!

I just did mri of both hips looking for same things. 1. Do the steroids cause this or is this part of having PMR? Feel better soon.

Jeannaé

Linda,

I,too, am 73, living in CO, USA, and have MEDICARE A and B and a secondary and getting things covered. we are blessed. Hope you are doing well.

J

Hi! Yes we are blessed, too, with our insurance coverage. I am in Oregon, USA.

I think it very much depends on the underlying cause of the symptoms and there are several. I had a colleague whose wife had PMR symptoms which resolved with pred but she couldn't cope with the side effects so he discussed it with her rheumies in Hungary who agreed to try abx - I don't know what or what dose or for how long though. It worked - or was it coincidence that the symptoms resolved at the same time? I have never found any work looking at it.

There have been patients who have commented that they note fewer symptoms during treatment with abx - and others for whom it makes no difference. The symptoms almost always return soon after discontinuing the abx.