Question
Hi. I am a 24 year old female and am just trying to figure out what could be going on. I went to my PCP about a year ago for feelings of fatigue and just not feeling right. She ran a few blood tests and said I had an iron deficiency and was put on a supplement. Over the past year I have been experiencing some symptoms which may or may not be related but include: fatigue, depression, joint pain in my knee, headaches, back, neck & shoulder aches (a clicking has developed in my shoulder), a "pins & needles" feeling that leads to some numbness in my arms & legs that has woken me up at night, sharp pains that shoot through the left side of my chest, when it's cold out - a couple of fingers (from the tip to the first knuckle) will turn yellow-white and become numb & cold, my weight is normally around 120 - I am now at 107lbs, I have gotten very painful muscle spasms in my feet that last for 5-10 minutes, and in the past 2 months I have developed thinning hair loss. In the past year I've also developed numerous ovarian cysts on both sides that have caused some lower abdominal pain, which my OB/GYN finds strange because I have been on Ortho-tricylen which should prevent the development of cysts. Because of all this, I went to my PCP this past November and she ran some blood tests. Of all the tests, there were two that came back abnormal - the ANA came back positive at 1:640 speckled and Ferritin test came back at 15ng/mL. My known family history includes a mother with fibromyalgia & arthritis and a father who has arthritis and gout. I went to see a lupus specialist who did not run any additional tests, and simply asked me if I had ever developed a rash on my face (which I haven't). She said because I don't have the rash I don't have lupus and to ignore the ANA result, that I was just stressed out. My PCP was appalled at this and has subsequently scheduled me to see someone else and scheduled me to have an echocardiogram, which I did this morning. I'm just looking for any opinion you might have as to what could be going on and if there's anything I should be knowledgeable to ask about for this next appointment.

Thank you very much for any help you can offer.


Answer
Allison,

You can not rule out lupus for a lack of rash on your face. There will usually be some type of skin symptoms somewhere. Whether it is lupus or not, your ana is fairly high which strongly suggests that you have some type of autoimmune problem.

Autoimmune diseases can be hard to diagnose. This means that sometimes you have to keep pushing your doctors until they can come up with a accurate diagnosis. You should not have to suffer the way you describe.

Keeping a medical journal may help in this process. Here is an article that explains how to do this.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/367973/keeping_a_medical_journal_can_im...

While you may not have lupus here is some information about its symptoms.

http://arthritis-symptom.com/lupus/lupus-symptoms.htm

Rusty