What is ‘Fibromyalgia?’ Like all medical words, it can be broken down into several parts:
‘Mya’ means muscle, ‘algia’ means pain, and ‘fibro’ means the outer coverings of the muscle.
While widespread back pain is not new, the term ‘Fibromyalgia’ is! FM was first identified by Moldofsky & Smyth, two Canadian rheumatologists, who named the multiple symptoms as a separate entity. They discovered that FM patients suffered from lack of stage 4 REM (rapid eye movement) sleep.
While the other 3 or 4 stages of REM seemed unaffected. In experiments where healthy subjects were deprived of stage 4 REM sleep, symptoms of FM surfaced within 3-4 nights!
In 1986 Swedish doctors also discovered that there was oxygen deprivation of the involved (painful) muscles.
Dr. Bennette of Portland Oregon identified sleep disorders, muscle deconditioning, and hormone variations associated with FM patients.
More and more research is being done all the time.
Fibromyalgia is mis-diagnosed in many people. Some are told they have it when they don’t… It’s getting to be a very popular diagnosis!
However, many more are told they don’t have it when they do! Because it’s much more common in women than men, many (older male chauvinist pigs) doctors cruelly pass it off as ‘Female hysteria, hypochondria,’ or just a lack of anything better to complain about!
According to the American Colleges of Orthopedics and Rheumatology you must have 11 or more of the 18 designated pain points on your body, to ‘Officially’ have Fibromyalgia!
However, if you have it, you know that just having pain on 11-18 places on your body doesn’t begin to describe the agony and debilitation you suffer! Insomnia and joint stiffness must also be present to be a true case of fibromyalgia.
So what are the symptoms of Fibromyalgia?
1) First, and foremost: Muscle pain: mostly in the back and neck. You know, the 18 points. Sometimes pain covers the whole muscle, but many times it appears as small points (about the size of a dime) all over the back. As the condition worsens, there can be more and more points which get larger and larger, sometimes covering huge areas of the whole body.
2) Weakness in muscles, particularly in the back, neck, arms, and legs is a common symptom.
3) The third most common symptom is Fatigue. Throughout the day, and even upon waking. It seems you’re never fully rested!
4) Insomnia is common: mostly precipitated by the pain. The patient can not get comfortable, even in bed.
5) In advancing stages, memory loss and confusion seems common. Usually attributed to the unrelenting nature of the pain, and the associated brain chemical exhaustion
Do not be afraid of Fibromyalgia, at first the severity of pain is very scary and frustrating; however it is very important that calmness prevails because anxiety will only make things worse.
If you have three or more of these symptoms, you should stop into our Maple Grove office and ask Dr. Jerod for a brief consultation, or give us a call at 763-420-2226.
Connect With Us