Question
My RA level shows 120 from my recent test, and my PC said she thought that was high, also she looked at a past test I had taken last year when I had went to a podiatrist for pain in my feet and it showed 200, what do you think of these levels?, and it seems it dropped a lot from my recent level and last years level.I don't know if the rheumatologist even knew my levels as I look back on it all now, I know he wasn't at all comfortable to talk to, he just told me I didn't have rheumatoid when he looked at my hands and ask questions about which foot hurt worse after me saying they hurt, and squeezed my toes really hard and never would give me much of a chance to tell him very much at all, he just said I had a choice to take a shot in my foot if I wanted I guess for the pain from the tumors, if not it was up to me, then he told me to go get some new balance shoes and he put 2 pads he calls cookies in them and sent me on my way. I left in total shock of how rude and uncaring he seemed, am I misjudging him you think or I'm just new to this field of medicine? I couldn't even think, and so I forgot to ask him about what he thought what the levels meant.

Answer
Nadine,

120 is a very high RA Factor. Normal is 0 - 15. This does not mean that you have Rheumatoid Arthritis but it does mean that something is wrong. RA Factor is an antibody that attacks your bodies own tissue. You do not have this unless there is something going on. 80 percent of the time it is Rheumatoid Arthritis.

This was horrible treatment from your rheumatologist.

I would ask your doctor to refer you to another rheumatlogist based on a repeated test showing extremely high RA.

Rusty
http://arthritis-symptom.com/Rheumatoid-arthritis-symptoms/index.htm